


The Champion of Misfortune (final part)

by G E Monica (J1NXY0)



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/F, F/M, Gen, Vampires, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 01:33:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 23,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22755580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/J1NXY0/pseuds/G%20E%20Monica
Summary: A continue from part 1: The Knight of Debauchery . Part 2 is the end of this first book. I have almost finished the second book as well, so there is plenty of more content to come soon.





	The Champion of Misfortune (final part)

**Author's Note:**

> The Old Gods:  
> Viscar – Maker of Yaima and Father of Men  
> Lenos – Mother of Plants and Animals  
> Mear – Goddess of Beauty, Art and Love  
> Alois – God of Knowledge and Cunning  
> Gardoz – God of War and Death
> 
> The Elven Gods:  
> Daeron Fy’reon – Creator and Preserver of Elves  
> Aithera Viona – Mother of Elves and Nature
> 
> The Llichivar Goddesses:  
> Maiya – Mother White Dragon, Power Absolute, Water and Wind.  
> Muraz – Mother Iridescent Phoenix, Balance Ever-last, Fire and Earth.

PART TWO 

The Knight of Guts and Blood

Chapter Twenty  
No Escape

Summer was just around the corner for the country of Ayrev, yet that didn’t stop the skies from being smudged with grey clouds and the city streets overloaded with rain. With a blotted out sun and moon, the nights felt long, particularly for the gang of guards that had banded together to escape the merciless warrior that hunted them.  
“In here,” their leader shouted urgently, pointing to a tavern that still had its doors open. He ran inside, the hawk feather in his helm soaked flat, the flintlock pistol on his side just as soggy.  
His posse followed suit, barricading the door behind them with a dining chair.  
“Did you see Barry? His head came clean off,” one of the guards fretted, trying desperately to shake the water out of his rifle.  
“Can I help you fine gentlemen?” the tavern owner stepped out from his backroom, folding a towel into a neat square. “Looking for a place to bunk for the night?”  
“Shut up,” barked the ring-leader, throwing his useless pistol to the wooden floorboards and drawing the elegant sabre at his side.  
“We should surrender,” the first guard continued to fret.  
“There are eight of us, there’s no way –” he began to argue back.  
His words were interrupted by the cold-blooded killer hacking through the front door with brute strength, sheer determination and well-crafted blades.  
Kicking the flimsy chair out of her way to join the group of guards inside, “I remember you.” The hunter grinned at the leader, her bright white teeth a shocking contrast to the blood that was smeared across her face and flecked in her blond hair.  
Almost all of the guards aimed their rifles at her, desperately squeezing the triggers, but the sparks just weren’t there. One of the guards got lucky and his gun was dry enough to fire a bullet from the barrel. It fired high and far, grazing the top of the grinning woman’s head and imbedding in the doorframe behind her.  
In retrospect, perhaps he hadn’t been lucky at all, as the gunshot sent the woman into a killing frenzy. She lunged for him first, cutting his rifle in half with her long blade before shoving the angled point of it through his abdomen.  
The warrior swept all of her strength upwards, tearing the blade through his body, where it exited through his shoulder and plummeted into the guard standing behind him.  
“Yaaagh!” a third guard ran up behind the woman with his sabre drawn, attempting a downward hack at her.  
Her main-hand sword was currently imbedded in the neck of her second target. She side stepped the reckless hacking sabre, drew her shorter sword in one fluid motion, slicing into the guts of her attacker. He keeled over backwards, shrieking with agony.  
Her secondary sword went back into its’ sheath and the manically grinning woman kicked her previous victim off the end of her blade.  
The remaining alive guardsmen dropped their weapons and backed up into the counter of the almost bare-bone tavern. It’s owner cowering and whimpering in the backroom.  
“Are you just going to let her kill your friends?” the ring-leader demanded with rage.  
“Stop hiding behind your men,” the hunter said, sheathing both of her swords, yet she still stalked the room, hostile and ready to kill.  
“No, wait,” the leader began to grovel, “I showed you mercy, did I not? I know what I did was wrong. I was only messing around, understand? Please!”  
“Pathetic,” the warrior spat with disgust. “Raise your weapon, die with some dignity.”  
“No, no, arrest me, take me to court, lock me away, just don’t kill me,” he panicked, retching slightly as he watched the two dead guards behind her staining the wooden floor red. The third guard wasn’t quite dead yet, his name was Paul and he was struggling to shove his intestines back into his body. “I have important allies. People that are more powerful than you, that will make you regret this!”  
“I doubt that,” she said, her patience wearing thin. She casually walked forwards and unleashed her sword from its wooden carved sheath, cutting through his chain mail vest. Blood exploded from the opening in his chest, further coating her face and dark battle leathers.  
The corrupt guard ring-leader fell to his knees, gasping his last breath, coughing up dark blood in front of Rozaline Kiezar’s feet. She unhooked four pairs of handcuffs from her belt for the four surviving guards, and personally escorted them to the guard tower jail cells.

***

“… He said he had powerful allies?” Red inquired, once Roza had regaled him of her hunt.  
The Gardozian captain had bathed, washed away the blood of her enemies and slipped into her big bed. Her vampiric assistant had been slowly, day by day, venturing outside the confines of the office. Yet, Red dared not climb into bed or even touch Roza again, not whilst his desires were still a mixture of lust and hunger for fresh, flowing blood.  
Roza shrugged beneath her covers, “I have powerful allies as well.”  
“Yes, but don’t you think that you could have pried information out of him before killing him? If there is some sort of a leader that we can’t find, then we haven’t solved anything,” he pointed out.  
“Shit,” she murmured sleepily.  
Red sat down gently in one of the green armchairs, watching his beautiful captain struggle to stay awake. The room was dark, yet he could see perfectly and he had never seen Roza look so peaceful and tranquil. Any normal person would probably be heightened with adrenaline and remorse after ending half a dozen lives. If he didn’t know Roza so well, he would have thought her actions were odd, trained as a Gardozian zealot, she believes that death is a beautiful thing, that it is in her very nature to reap lives…

Chapter Twenty-One  
The Other Gardozian

Well rested and back on track with her Gardozian goals, Roza’s daily routine consisted of exercising and training her guards in the morning, checking on Red and the paperwork at midday and in the evenings she went out investigating. She hadn’t seen Vay’len for a few weeks now, not since he had been teaching Jamie how to control his gifts.  
With a tip off from Seth, Roza knew exactly where to start sniffing around for Ravens and any other mischief makers. The Yellow Grape, advertised itself as a public lounge where wealthy city-folk were encouraged to get rip-roaring drunk. Circling around the edge of Raydon, Roza discovered the converted barn – the effortlessly elegant lounge. Seth hadn’t told her what to expect inside, he clearly wasn’t too pleased about the area either, but does he ever not seem grim?  
At first glance, The Yellow Grape looked like a stately home. The sort of house Roza expected Celeste Alberona to have grown up in. From the lights and the noise within, and the heat, Roza could already tell it was a popular place.  
She was smart enough to not wear her guard captain uniform on her evening investigations. She always wore her dark leather armour instead, now that it had been repaired of fire damage. With her pair of ornate swords, she had the appearance of a fashionable mercenary, more than a guard and that meant she fit in almost everywhere in Raydon. Perhaps lacking a gun made the disguise a bit riskier, but Roza truly was a creature of habit.  
She pushed inside the Grape, where the queue for the bar was long. The floor was hard to see past all of the bodies, so confined in such a small lounge. It was almost as if everyone from the Spring ball had crammed themselves inside to mingle, chat and dance. From somewhere, Roza couldn’t see music was playing, a piano, singing and people clapping to the rhythm that was all around the lounge. This is hopeless, why did you send me here Seth Rannen?  
Someone stood on Roza’s foot, hard. She winced and had to refrain from lashing out at the clumsy oaf.  
“Oh, I’m sorry,” gasped the young woman that had walked over Roza’s foot. She was pretty and smiling apologetically, batting thick eyelashes over her warm brown eyes. She was Barassian. Roza thought that she had to be purely Barassian and almost as beautiful as the queen of the desert country. She represented everything Roza had run away from.  
Despite the Barassian woman’s distracting beauty, and all the ways she reminded Roza of her deceased fiancé, her roaming hand didn’t go unnoticed, nor did the ivory carved swords that she wore beneath her long black frock coat.  
“I have enough money on me for a few drinks, if that’s what you’re lookin’ for,” Roza grinned, catching the pickpocket by the wrist.  
“No,” the woman played coy, “I was just admiring your swords. I don’t often meet another woman carrying so much metal.” She unbuttoned her coat fully, revealing a red satin blouse, a golden pendant and the pair of galdarkas that she carried.  
Roza played dumb, “Wow, you’re a Gardozian Knight?” she said charmingly, “I’d love to buy you a drink, but the bar is rammed.”  
“There’s another bar upstairs,” the would-be thief informed, raising her voice above the chatter and music.  
“You’re kidding?”  
The Barassian chuckled and grabbed Roza’s hand, dragging her through the crowds and up a flight of busy steps. Roza knew most Gardozian families, and the woman leading her didn’t seem at all familiar or even built to be a knight. They looked roughly the same age, but there was nothing bulky or muscular about the impostor. If she could only get a better look at the galdarkas, Roza could tell which family they belonged to. Gods above, don’t let them be father’s…  
“What’s your name?” Roza asked, once they had found a seat at the secondary bar. It was a little less busy and chaotic, but there was still a bit of a wait to get served.  
“Taylor Satza,” the woman replied proudly.  
“I’ve never heard of that family,” she grinned back, “I’m Asha.”  
They shook hands, locking eyes for a long time. Roza was enchanted, but also curious to find out if Taylor truly was a Gardozian Knight.  
“Are you a mercenary?” the Barassian wondered.  
“Yep,” Roza nodded, “I imagine you are far more skilled with a blade than I am.”  
Taylor smirked, finally dragging her eyes away from the exotic blond merc long enough to order two cocktails. “Are you from Menos?”  
“How did you guess,” she chuckled.  
“Don’t see a lot of blonds this side of the water,” Taylor said, wearing a dreamy expression, resting her chin on her fist to stare at Roza.  
“That works for you, huh?”  
She nodded her chin against her knuckles, looking up at the strong mercenary with doe-like eyes. “Escaping the war like everyone else here?” the knight wondered.  
“Hmm, why? Are you goin’ to try drag me back and fight Drow? There ain’t enough gold in the Solaris Kingdom that could tempt me to join that suicidal fight,” Roza lied through her charming grin.  
“I’d indeed like to drag you somewhere,” Taylor flirted, “But don’t worry, it will be a pleasurable experience.” She subtly slipped her hand onto Roza’s thigh and fluttered her long lashes.  
Roza was grateful that their cocktails had finally arrived, clear liquor in a fancy wide brim glass, accompanied by a green olive speared on a tiny stick. Everything about Taylor screamed danger, but that only made Roza want the woman more.  
“Do you not like the drink, Asha?” she worried.  
“I like it. It’s a bit fancier than what I’m used to.”  
“It’s called a martini,” Taylor said, turning away from the mercenary to drink the clear liquid. “Have I been too forward? Was it wrong of me to assume that a swordswoman like myself also has the same… impulses?”  
“I have a tendency to drink too much,” Roza admitted, “You’re lovely, Taylor, and powerful. I’d like to remember your face in the morning, and not wake up with a hangover.”  
“I know what you mean,” she uttered, “It’s easier to drink, instead of thinking of all the morally ambiguous things I’ve done.”  
Maybe we have met before, Roza speculated. “Do you eat the olive?” she asked with amusement, picking up the stick.  
“If you want,” Taylor shrugged.  
“Shame to waste it,” she grinned, pulling the olive off the stick with her teeth. Roza paid the tab, got up from her bar stool and left her drink unfinished.  
Taylor sighed into her cocktail, giving up altogether.  
“You comin’?” Roza beckoned.  
Taylor looked up from her half finished drink, her brown eyes lighting up. She hopped up from the stool, the galdarkas at her sides clanking.  
“At least eat your olive,” Roza laughed playfully. 

***

They made it a few blocks away from The Yellow Grape lounge, hand in hand, until Roza could no longer resist her urges. She pulled Taylor into a narrow alleyway and kissed her wide lips. The Barassian hummed with satisfaction and relief into Roza’s mouth, wrapping her arms around her in an embrace.  
I’ve missed this, Roza realised she had been so busy cleaning up the city recently, that she hadn’t been intimate with anyone for weeks. In fact, the last person she had kissed must have been Vay’len, and it had hardly been passionate or prolonged. Besides, women are better at kissing anyway.  
Taylor threaded her fingers through Roza’s bright hair, kissing her with urgency and hunger. She almost found herself lost in Taylor’s soft lips.  
“Are you staying somewhere?” Roza managed to ask breathlessly between kisses.  
“I’m a Gardozian,” Taylor panted, “We can stay anywhere you like, honey.”  
She chuckled wryly, lightly biting the Barassian’s bottom lip.  
“There is a Mear temple just outside the city gates,” Taylor suggested.  
“Sounds fitting,” Roza grinned, planting several kisses on her neck.  
They put their ravaging on pause to hurry through the darkened streets, leaving the boundaries of Raydon city. It had been a while since Roza had seen more trees than buildings and breathed clean country air.  
“There,” Taylor pointed to a white structure on the top of a small hill. A temple that looked older than the city it bordered against.  
Roza slipped her arm around Taylor’s waist and lifted her up over her shoulder, carrying the slim woman up the steps towards the temple of Mear. Taylor laughed freely, dangling down Roza’s back. “I like this view,” she admired.  
“So do I,” Roza said, running her hand slowly up Taylor’s thigh as she powered up the old stone steps.  
The double doors were wide open, Roza carried Taylor inside the overpoweringly sweet scented temple. The interior of the old structure was decorated with springtime flowers and an array of tiny candles.  
“Shall we fuck on the altar?” she jested.  
“Blasphemous,” Taylor giggled. “I think a bed would be more suitable.”  
“Are you sure? There’s a fantastic mirror here, for me to admire my work,” Roza grinned mischievously, turning around to head deeper into the temple, down a small set of stairs in search of a room with a bed.  
“That will do,” Taylor called, still dangling from Roza’s shoulder.  
Roza pushed on the door, entering an unoccupied priestess’ room. “For patrons of a goddess of love, they sure have small beds.”  
“It will do!”  
“Someone gettin’ impatient back there?” Roza sniggered. She flopped Taylor down onto the violet sheets before shutting the door behind her.  
“Gods, that was hot,” Taylor admitted, highly flustered. She removed her long woollen coat and began to unbuckle the galdarkas from her belt.  
“Hmm?” Roza lunged back towards the bed, helping Taylor out of her satin blouse.  
“I don’t think I’ve ever had anyone carry me to bed before,” she elaborated.  
Roza’s eyes flitted to the incredibly rare swords that were so carelessly thrown to one side. Her focus soon flicked back to the beautiful Barassian, with strong, proud features, warm eyes, caramel skin and wonderful black hair. Nothing attracted Roza more than dark hair. Perhaps it had been engrained into her, since almost every Imperial she knew had dark hair.  
With only a bit of cloudy moonlight cascading through the window, it was hard to see in the room. But Roza could still tell that Taylor’s body was perfect. Slim, slender and athletic, yet still feminine.  
“Come on, get your kit off too,” Taylor demanded with a gleeful giggle.  
“Soon,” Roza purred, her grin a brief slash of white in the dim room. She dragged Taylor’s bare body to the bottom of the bed, kneeling down on the stone floor to tease and kiss her most intimate area.  
Taylor quickly began to whimper in pleasure, wrapping her legs around Roza’s neck. I’ve missed this too, Roza thought, getting lost in the ecstasy and lust and excitement of gratifying another person’s body. The experience was only made better by not having to commit emotionally to the delicious woman. She could go her separate way and need not ever see Taylor again. She might have had more fun with Red, if she didn’t have to see him and work with him on a daily basis. I wonder what a vampire is like in bed though…  
“Oh, oh gods, Asha,” Taylor moaned breathlessly.  
Who’s Asha? Roza forgot for a moment, so distracted by the warmth and the taste of Taylor. She sort of regretted giving a false name. Hearing Rozaline uttered from those gorgeous lips would have been more enticing, or Kiezar would have really made her lose it.  
She sprung up from the cold floor, clawing her way up the borrowed bed. Roza unbuckled her belt and carefully hung her swords up on the headboard.  
“You like to keep them close, huh?” Taylor noticed, still writhing with satisfaction.  
“You never know,” Roza winked, peeling off the rest of her garments. She dipped down to nuzzle Taylor’s neck, familiarising herself with the scent of her. Undoubtedly Barassian, Taylor had a spicy perfume; cardamom, cinnamon, chilli, so many warm aromas wrapped into one.  
There’s no way you’re a Gardozian Knight… Roza couldn’t help but suspect, pulling Taylor closer, caressing her soft skin. She had a few marks on her arms, but they were nothing compared to the scars adorning her own body.  
Taylor was clearly more fascinated with Roza’s full breasts than her scars, going to work with her fingers and lips. It was Roza’s turn to whimper and moan with pleasure. Finally, someone who knows what they’re doing.  
They touched and kissed and played for what felt like hours. It was hard to tell how much time went by whilst their minds and bodies were in such a euphoric state, time ceased to exist. Roza hadn’t found any other experience quite like it. Sex could heal her or destroy her. It was her addiction and her freedom. There was nothing more fulfilling than climaxing.  
She was already so close. Roza climbed on top of Taylor, rocking against her, their fingers delving into each other. Roza leant forwards to connect her mouth with Taylor’s, their tongues filling each other and together they reached the pinnacle of absolute bliss.  
“Asha,” the Barassian murmured softly.  
Asha kissed her on the forehead, and tucked up against her like spoons in the small bed, “Hmm?”  
“Let’s have a rest and then go again,” she suggested wickedly.  
Gardoz help me, she’s perfect, Roza grinned against her shoulder, letting her hand caress and wander across Taylor’s smooth body. 

Chapter Twenty-Two  
Matching Pair 

Daylight seeped through the small window, illuminating the colourfully decorated bedroom and the two naked women curled up together.  
Roza blinked sleepily, wondering how in the world she had managed to stay sober. You really did sidetrack me, she reminisced the night before as she peered over at every inch of Taylor.  
She quietly and carefully unhooked her swords from the headboard and climbed out of the tiny bed. Taylor appeared to be spark out. Must have really worn her out, Roza grinned to herself and went across the room, struggling to separate her dark armour from Taylor’s similarly dark clothes.  
She found the galdarkas first. Roza crouched down, letting her fingertips tenderly brush against the ancient carved ivory, the impossibly detailed designs that depicted the history of the family that the swords belonged to. A stag on the hilt, a mountain and a river running down the case, with soldiers standing at the bottom, awaiting the Gardozian reaper who held the same blade that Roza was holding now.  
She pulled both blades from their cases just an inch to check that they were the real deal, and not incredibly crafted replicas. They’re real, Roza shook with pure jubilation. She was also confused to how the young Barassian would have acquired them.  
“Hey,” Taylor stirred behind her, “You sneaking off?”  
Roza stood back up slowly. She’d only got as far as putting her leggings on and attaching her own swords to her belt. As it was now, she was carrying four swords and she’d never felt so powerful.  
“What happened to your back?” Taylor asked, sitting up abruptly.  
“Satza, aye?” Roza recalled the family name. An insignificant name. The crime for stealing from a Gardozian Knight is death. It’s a shame she is so good in bed.  
“You’re that captain of the city guard, the one that ran into that fire,” Taylor realised with horror. “Shit, I’ve really messed up.”  
Roza put her shirt on, covering the melted scars of her skin and put her armoured vest over the top. “Why do you have the Buckeye family galdarkas?” she wondered, subtly blocking the way out.  
“I stole them,” Taylor admitted, sitting on the edge of the bed, almost curling into a foetal position. “You’re Rozaline Kiezar, then? I don’t understand. Did you know all along?”  
“I’m asking the questions,” she growled menacingly, “These should be inside the Avery palace. How did you get them?”  
Taylor let out a small groan as if she had a stomach ache. She clutched her belly as if she did. “I am Imperial, okay? I look Barassian, my parents are, but I was born in Claynore and abandoned there. I inherited nothing from them but their appearance. I’ve always survived just scraping by. I got good at sneaking into the palace kitchens, there was always plenty of food there. I ventured further and further in and over the years I found a display room and I saw those,” she explained, pointing to the galdarkas in Roza’s hand. “Those were my way out. A ticket out of Claynore, an escape from the approaching war. I came here to pretend to be a Knight so that I could have anything I wanted. I could live a life of luxury.”  
Roza shook her head with disapproval. “What were you going to do if you had to duel someone?”  
“Nobody duels a Gardozian Knight. It is suicide,” Taylor said, wiping away the tears that were betraying her. Tears had never got her very far in the past, but did it matter now – now that I’m going to die?  
“True,” she said coolly, “Thanks for your honesty, Taylor, if that’s even your name.”  
“It is, I didn’t lie about that,” she muttered, wiping away more tears. She uncurled from the bed and stood with her back straight. “Make it quick, okay?”  
Roza equipped the second pair of swords to her belt, the burden was noticeable, before handing Taylor her red blouse. “Killing you would be such a waste,” Roza began to grin, admiring the bravery and dignity that Taylor portrayed. “I’m keeping the galdarkas though. I think I have a bit more claim to them, ya see?”  
Taylor held her breath until the guard captain left the room. She gasped and screamed into her blouse, elated to still be alive. How am I alive? Gardozians are brutal when it comes to crimes… but then again, she is a Kiezar. 

***

Roza strolled back to the guard tower in a pleasant mood. It was finally beginning to look like summer had arrived, she’d had a fantastic, non-committal night and acquired a set of galdarkas in the process. Things are starting to look up, for a change, she thought optimistically.  
Entering the modern looking tower, Roza found Vay’len sat cross-legged on the floor outside her office, his eyes half shut and his body peaceful.  
“Uh, hey?” she greeted curiously.  
He looked up at her steadily, somewhat smiling with relief before frowning with confusion. “Are those real?” he asked, pointing at her new galdarkas.  
“Indeed.”  
Vay’len stood up, reaching out slowly to put a hand on her shoulder. “Roza, I had no idea… when did it happen?”  
She puzzled briefly, “last night?”  
“I’m so sorry. How did it happen?” he wondered gently.  
Roza frowned down at the hand that continued to comfort her. Then it clicked. “These aren’t my father’s galdarkas. They’re Buckeye’s. I caught a thief that had stolen them from the imperial palace,” she explained.  
The elf sighed and finally looked relieved again. He retracted his hand from her shoulder and tapped his fingertips together. “Did you arrest him?”  
“It was a her, and no,” Roza grinned with a dreamy expression on her face.  
“Right…” he continued to fiddle with his fingers.  
“You need something?” she presumed.  
“Ah, yes,” he uttered quietly. “Do you want to come have breakfast with me?”  
“Breakfast?” Roza repeated suspiciously.  
“We haven’t spoken in a while since finding Jamie. I thought… well, I thought we could have a catch up,” he admitted shyly.  
“How long have to been sat here?”  
Vay’len shrugged, “I went into a reverie for a few hours.”  
“A rever-what?”  
“It’s sort of like meditating.”  
“Ah,” Roza raised her eyebrows, “Oh, that thing elves do instead of sleeping.”  
“Yes,” he said quietly. “Did you want to? I wasn’t sure if you still gave your guards a rest on Sunday, if you’ve already made plans, I could come back later?”  
“No-no, I would like to have breakfast with you, Vay,” she said, smiling playfully. 

Chapter Twenty-Three  
Breakfast 

“How’s your back doing?” Vay’len inquired. He had picked the venue, a quaint tearoom that had survived the war that had ravaged Raydon two decades ago. There was a cosy, old fashioned open fireplace, low hanging wooden beams and much of the mahogany furniture was slightly worm eaten. He had already ordered a fruit salad, and Roza a large bowl of porridge. She had chosen coffee. He’d gone for berry tea.  
“Its fine now,” she replied, “just unsightly, I imagine.” Roza leant back in her wooden chair and it creaked rather insecurely against her weight.  
“Good,” he uttered, idly playing with the ceramic sugar bowl. “How is Michael doing?”  
“I take him out for walks at night,” she said with amusement. “How is Jamie doing?”  
“Well, I’m glad you asked,” Vay’len livened up a bit, looking across the table at her with his bright blue eyes. “He’s told me that he wants to find Diana Hölzer.”  
Roza almost knocked over her coffee that arrived at that same moment. “Is she still alive?” she asked with surprise.  
“I don’t think she can die.”  
“No one has seen her since the Blood War, when she disappeared with Claynores’ former general,” Roza pointed out, stirring sugar into her porridge.  
“You know your history,” Vay’len tilted his head towards her with approval, before tucking into his fruit.  
“Aye, my parents were there.”  
“So were mine,” he said, letting that coincidence hang in the air for a moment. “And I think they might know how to find her.”  
Roza shrugged, swallowing a mouthful of the cooked oats. “If not, I bet Sheri Curlain can find them. But why is Jamie so interested? How is he so interested? Because he’s in somewhat way related to Diana, ya think?”  
Vay’len smiled whimsically, “I like how you answer your own questions.”  
“I can hold long conversations with myself, it’s quite the skill,” she grinned.  
He took a sip of his bright pink tea and went on, “The problem is, Victor is quite adamant about his son travelling to Syl’radin City with me. He seems to think that I’m going to indoctrinate the boy into our weird elven cult.”  
“I thought that was your plan all along?” she joked wildly.  
“Ah-hah,” Vay’len pretended to cackle wickedly.  
“I can tag along if it would make Victor more compliant,” Roza suggested.  
“That would be very helpful, Rozaline,” he said, staring down at his breakfast.  
She focused on finishing her porridge before glancing back at Vay’len. “How have you been though, in general?” she asked quietly, showing a small part of her softer side.  
“I miss her. I miss her a lot,” Vay’len admitted, picking at the rest of his fruit.  
“Well,” Roza said enthusiastically, finishing off her coffee, “Let’s not waste any time.” 

***

Victor wasn’t easy to convince. Roza had never known anyone so stubborn, and it took over an hour to persuade and convince the inventor that they weren’t trying to kidnap his son.  
“He’s not a child, anymore,” Violet reminded her husband.  
Jamie had packed an overnight bag, but his father was still looming by the front door as if he would change his mind.  
“You can’t protect him forever,” she added.  
“As if he cares,” Jamie uttered under his breath, slinging his bag over his shoulder.  
Victor scowled at the industrial door, his emerald eyes losing focus for a second before he departed without another word or argument, returning to his inventing studio.  
“I’ll make sure he comes back,” Roza vowed before bidding Violet goodbye.  
“Did you pack your spare glasses, just in case?” Violet fussed, kissing her boy on the cheek.  
“Yeah-yeah,” Jamie squirmed away from her embrace, highly embarrassed.  
“Let’s go,” Roza beckoned.  
Outside the shop and through the narrow road, Vay’len awaited them with three rented horses. Two dapple grey mares and the third was a chestnut stallion.  
“Uh, I’ve never ridden a horse before,” Jamie admitted.  
“Maybe you should ride with me then,” Roza offered.  
“Sure,” he said hesitantly, “Do they bite?”  
“Only when they aren’t tamed,” she grinned.  
Vay’len gracefully mounted one of the mares and Roza vaulted up onto the stallion before offering her hand down to Jamie.  
He scrabbled up behind her, “oh no,” he uttered nervously, “I don’t like this. I don’t like this at all.”  
“Just hold onto the saddle,” she advised, taking in the horses’ reins. She gave the steed a nudge and he began to walk, his metal shoes clacking against the stone road.  
Vay’len pointed his horse in the right direction and began to lead towards the nearest way out of the city. Their spare horse followed eagerly.  
“I can’t believe Victor stalled us for so long,” Jamie complained, once he had gotten over his nerves of sitting on top of an animal three times his size.  
Those nerves soon returned when they left Raydon and the horses hit open meadows. Roza could tell that her stallion was eager to gallop, and she had no business in stopping the beautiful creature from running free on a surprisingly sunny day.  
“No, no-no-no-no,” Jamie shrieked, clinging onto the back of Roza’s coat and hiding his face from the horror.  
Vay’len watched with amusement as the pair of them whizzed past. He urged his horse to go faster, to catch up and then he was racing Roza to reach the edge of Pelago Forest first.  
They were neck and neck, sprinting towards the quickly approaching tree line. Roza had always been competitive, and she often made everything in her life into a game. Both horses seemed to be having just as much fun as their racing riders, so happy to stretch their powerful legs.  
“Come on, come on,” Roza grinned broadly, encouraging her stallion to go faster. She hadn’t ridden in years, but it had been part of her rigorous training – Gardozian Knights were the most terrifying cavalry in history – and being back in the saddle felt so natural to her. She felt so alive.  
Vay’len’s long, raven black hair billowed behind him, and he laughed joyfully. For him he had grown up around animals, both domestic and wild. The elf understood creatures more than he did people. He always rode without a saddle, and today was no exception. He leant forwards, breathing in the mares’ mane and began to pull away, taking the lead, reaching the forest in a matter of minutes.  
Vay’len dismounted at the edge of the dense tree line, the horse with no rider soon joining him. “You took your time,” he chuckled once Roza and Jamie finally caught up.  
“You weren’t carrying dead-weight,” she panted, attempting to pry Jamie off her back.  
“Sore loser,” Vay’len beamed playfully.  
Roza had never seen the elf’s face light up with so much glee before. It was refreshing, after watching him mope around for so long. There was something magical about his bright smile that made it hard for Roza to look away.  
“Is it over?” Jamie quaked, looking even paler than usual.  
“Aye,” Roza nodded, tearing her gaze away from the Eladrin. She slid out of the saddle and held her arms out to catch the dazed young man.  
“We will have to go by foot from here to Syl’radin,” Vay’len informed. Light on his feet, he moved forwards to relieve the stallion of his saddle and bridle. “They have plenty of grass to keep them happy until we return.”  
“When will we return?” Jamie wondered.  
“Tomorrow morning, I should hope,” Vay’len said, pulling out three squares of a homemade granola bar to treat the speedy horses.  
“What if I don’t want to go back home?”  
“I already promised your mother,” Roza said, sounding sterner than she meant to.  
“No offence towards your mentoring, Vay’len,” Jamie began, “But I’ve read just about every interesting book in the Silverstone library. I’ve heard claims that the Ancient Oak library of Syl’radin is far more vast and advanced.”  
Vay’len raised a long eyebrow, “You can read elvish, can you?”  
“Almost,” he admitted, “Victor may be ashamed of his heritage, but I am eager to embrace it.”  
“I see,” Vay’len muttered, patting the ridden mare on the nose, “So, did you even want to find Diana Hölzer at all?”  
“I do,” Jamie said, every fibre of him was desperate for answers, “I need to know why I’m this way – I can’t be the only mage left. I can’t – I’m scared okay? I know what this means for Yaima. Ananette gave our world a spark and the capacity for blood magic. If she was truly defeated and her Stargazers dispersed, then how come I saw the both of you months ago, bringing me to this exact same spot in a dream?” 

Chapter Twenty-Four  
The Way Forward 

Roza thought that Vay’len was taking them on a strange route towards his home. She lost all sense of direction once entering Pelago. The vast amount of trees made it dark and hard to see the extremely uneven terrain.  
Vay’len had to often call back the obstacles in their path, and it soon became a rhythm of listening to his voice for directions.  
“Stream!” he barked, after hours of trekking and continually warning the others about fallen logs and ancient boulders.  
“I can hear the water,” Roza informed, making a running jump across the stream to join the elf on the other side.  
Jamie walked alongside the stream for a moment, looking for a sensible and sturdy spot to just stretch his legs across it.  
“We’re nearly there,” Vay’len said.  
“Good,” Jamie smiled with excitement.  
“I think I’d be forever lost in this forest without a guide,” Roza admitted, looking up at Vay’len with admiration.  
“Out of your comfort zone, for a change?” he checked. “It is folly for anyone to venture into Pelago with no experience.”  
As he spoke, Vay’len sensed that someone was watching them. The hairs on the back of his neck tingled and he lifted his head to search the surrounding area.  
Jamie noticed it too, and silently pointed towards the grey stag that was examining them between the trees.  
Vay’len held his gaze with the stag for a few seconds before returning to the way forwards, onto Syl’radin. “They know that we’re on our way,” he said and began to speed up the pace, almost running to make it home before the stag could beat them.  
“Is that bad?” Roza wondered, making sure to stay close behind Jamie. She had a gut feeling that something bad was coming. Her godfather, Sir Samuel Eldridge was a true master of listening to his gut instincts. Her father had been the brash one, but with Sam at his side, they were both unstoppable Gardozian knights. One day I’ll find my own Sam Eldridge, Roza reminded herself, hurrying to keep up with Jamie.  
Vay’len rounded the massive trunk of a fir tree and waited for the two humans beside a dense thicket of yew. He waved his hand through the dark green bush to prove that it wasn’t truly material. He walked through the illusion and again waited for his followers to join him.  
“Clever,” Jamie marvelled at the magic of the fake yew.  
Roza nodded towards the pine boardwalk that they were now standing on, that sloped down drastically into the city gates of Syl’radin. “The guards look like statues,” she pointed out.  
Vay’len nodded, “They won’t let you take your weapons in.”  
“What?” Roza barked with indignation.  
“It’s only for one night, and I can assure you that my family home is safe,” he reassured.  
“They might as well take my clothes as well, that’s how naked I will feel,” she complained.  
“I’m afraid that Gardoz isn’t a patron to us here, your vows and exceptions don’t apply here. They will look after your swords,” he said gently. “Nor will your foreign magic work here, Jamie.”  
“That’s fine by me. I’d hate to accidentally burn down the library,” he said, rushing forwards to witness the last remaining Eladrin settlement.  
Roza unbuckled the heavy weight of her four swords and thrust them into the hands of one of the statue-like guards. Their armour was like nothing she had ever seen before; thin metal, surely too thin and wispy to protect their vital areas. Their shields and polearms just as delicate, silver and shiny like pearls.  
“Diola lle,” the female gate-guard nodded her tapered helmeted head at Roza upon receiving the belt of swords.  
The male gate-guard watched Jamie with a very cutting and scrutinizing eye as he passed through the pearly, marble gate. It soon became apparent, as the mage entered the city of spectacular design, and the spark of fire in his veins sputtered out. It was ripped out of him, as if his very self was being split in two. Jamie cried out, clutching his head, almost passing out from the pain.  
Vay’len sprung forwards to catch the immobilized mage by the arm. “I didn’t expect that to happen,” he said frantically, pressing his palm against Jamie’s head to ease away the pain with his own elvish magic.  
“I’m fine,” Jamie uttered, pushing each syllable through clenched teeth.  
“Let’s get you to my home, my mother can have a look at you,” he advised.  
They rushed across wooden bridges, in and out of tunnels that were carved through monumental sized trees. They descended a carved set of stairs that was wrapped around one of the many trees.  
“Forget the forest, this place is way more confusing,” Roza muttered, still sour about losing her swords. She might have marvelled at the beauty of the multi-tiered city that flowed so seamlessly with nature, if she hadn’t been in such a bad mood. 

***

The Nailir home was carved within one of the many ancient elven trees. The wood was pure white, akin to the rare whitewood trees that apparently only grew in Menos. Roza couldn’t fathom how impossibly big the trees of Syl’radin were though. She had lived in a moderately large house in Barass, but Vay’len’s tree house surely had to out scale it massively.  
Vynna Nailir met them in the entranceway, sensing the presence of her child approaching. She opened the front door wider and threw her arms around Vay’len. They matched in almost everyway – both wearing vibrant green and blue elven robes, their silky black hair flowing down their backs. Only now, Vay’len was noticeably taller than his mother.  
They pulled away from their embrace and Vynna met eye to eye with her guests. Roza instantly noticed another key difference – Vay’len’s mother had vibrant violet eyes that were lit up by the love for her son.  
His mother focused on Jamie, covering her chiselled lips with her fingertips. “Ro luu’ly en Ruam Linvar,” she blurted in elvish.  
Vay’len glanced back at the mage with curiosity, “He is Bella Hölzer’s grandchild,” he reminded.  
“It’s uncanny,” Vynna said, switching to Stintish to benefit her guests.  
“You said I look like someone? What is Ruam Linvar?” Jamie half translated the mystical tongue.  
“God Slayer,” she translated, still staring with amazement at the young man. “If it wasn’t for your darker eyes, I would say that you look exactly like Arkael Hölzer.”  
“You knew him?” Jamie beamed, flattered by the comparison. “You can help me find his daughter, Diana?”  
“My dear, I’m afraid Diana doesn’t want to be found,” she replied gently.  
“She has friends that might know?” he pressed.  
“Perhaps,” the Eladrin laced her fingers together, “Corbin Balvine would have answers, but he is not easy to find either.”  
“He’s been having clairvoyant dreams, emel,” Vay’len said to his mother.  
“Interesting,” Vynna mused, “Much like Elijah Haylin. Come, rest awhile. We will figure something out, I’m sure.” 

Chapter Twenty-Five  
Trespassers 

The day quickly grew late. Vynna prepared a meal of berries, nuts and seeds in her quaint, pinewood kitchen for her guests. Then after a tour around the Nailir’s exquisite garden, complete with a stream and a pond full of brightly coloured fish, Roza and Jamie were shown to separate bedrooms on the third floor of the tree home.  
Roza hadn’t uttered a word since arriving. She had watched Vay’len’s mother tentatively, politely listened to the guided tour and had reluctantly eaten the bird food dinner without complaint. There was a lot to take in; High elves – or Eladrin – seemed to live in a completely different world to the rest of Yaima.  
“Are you still angry about being disarmed?” Vay’len asked, after presenting the guest room to Roza. Her tight-lipped silence had not gone unnoticed by the wizard.  
She took in the familiar pinewood panel walls and floorboards, the silk curtains and bed covers were crisp and dyed bright yellow. “I think I’m in love with your mother,” she said, with an impish grin.  
Not exactly the answer Vay’len was expecting, he bit his lip, “Don’t let my father hear you say that,” he said with embarrassment, “We elves love eternally.”  
“Interesting,” she said, as if taking up such a challenge would be entertaining. She traced her fingertips across the clean, bright bed covers. “I’m not tired yet.”  
Vay’len paused for a moment. “I could show you the library, and you could pick a book to read.”  
Roza raised her eyebrows as if he was telling a mildly amusing joke.  
“Oh, but of course, you can’t read elvish,” he caught himself realising.  
“Is this really where you lived for a hundred years? Didn’t you get bored?” she wondered, sitting on the end of her bed.  
“Not really. I studied the arcane everyday,” he said, peering out the window to admire the peaceful garden.  
“But why?”  
“Because, I could,” Vay’len replied with a small degree of surprise, turning his long face back towards her. Her curiosity was surprising, and so was her scrutiny. He’d never thought about why he had wanted to be a wizard… it was just something that was done in his society. Something his family had always been part of.  
“Sorry I asked,” she said bluntly, lying back on the mattress to stare up at the hollowed out wooden ceiling.  
“I didn’t mean to sound cold,” he reflected.  
“You usually have a big, long explanation for everything. Something clever to say that makes me feel small,” Roza said, smiling almost peacefully at the pinewood, “But you don’t even know why you’re the way you are. You’re just as lost as I am.”  
He stepped closer to the bed, staring down at her briefly. “I just want to find somewhere I can belong,” he said quietly, before walking away.

***

Roza slept uneasily without her swords beside her pillow. When she did finally drift off, she dreamt of Taylor. The thief that had audaciously attempted to pickpocket her, and her first instinct was to buy her a drink and carry her to bed. It had been one of the best nights of Roza’s life, and she was so glad to relive it within her dream. It was rare to meet someone with as much guts as Taylor had; in a different lifetime, she could have made a perfect Gardozian Knight.  
Just as her dream was getting to the most excellent part, a loud pop and a flash of light awoke Roza from her slumber. After a few seconds of scrabbling around, looking for swords that were not there, she leapt out of the cosy elven bed and threw open the bright curtains. She looked down, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary with the tranquil garden.  
Roza put her leather coat on, but still felt naked without her blades as she left the room. “Vay’len?” she called down the tight spiral stairs. The flashes of bright light continued to burst from the lower levels.  
A male voice cried out with pain, filling the house with his sorrow.  
Jamie stepped out from a doorway opposite Roza, looking just as alarmed. “What’s going on?” he uttered, trying in vain to flatten his wild hair.  
“Maybe the vampires followed Vay’len here,” Roza said, mostly to herself.  
“Vampires? What vampires?” he stared at her with disbelief.  
With no time to acknowledge Jamie’s questions, Roza flung herself down the steps, not knowing what to expect or how she was supposed to fight with no weapons. She did have one thing though, and she could thank her father for it – she had no fear.  
She made it off the last step and rushed through several piles of ash and tattered cloth, noticing burn marks on the wooden walls of the hallway.  
And then the blood and the gore, which was all too familiar to the attack outside Silverstone, came into view. Roza was reminded of the night that Red had been torn into and turned into something dead – yet still living.  
The light was illuminating from the kitchen now, but it was growing dimmer.  
Roza slid across a line of blood that led towards a slender body, curled up but reaching out towards Vay’len.  
Vynna, the beautiful, ethereal Eladrin was sliced and torn apart, chunks missing from her body.  
Roza had to blink a few times to check that she wasn’t still dreaming. Vynna had been reaching out in her last few moments to protect her son. Her other hand concealed a silver-white dagger, caked in her own blood. Roza stooped to pick it up, and her own eyes could only see red as she rushed into the kitchen with a killer’s instinct.  
The wizards’ light was battling against the two shadowy figures. One was female, carrying a large greatsword, and the other was male, holding on tightly to a glowing green dagger. Behind them, slumped at the dining table was a male Eladrin. Dead. Roza presumed that he was Vay’len’s father, as he stared up blankly with those same impossible, sapphire blue eyes. His throat was slit and the wound festering with poison.  
The two intruders had made Vay’len watch his parents die, and now they were trapping him in a corner.  
“Hey! Assholes, how about we make this an even fight?” Roza barked, and grinned manically. Through her rage and her lack of a plan, it was miraculous that she could still grin.  
The two strangers turned slightly, caught off-guard by the defiant little human. They both had glowing red eyes, their skin dark purple and blotchy like a bruise.  
Roza caught sight of Vay’len, tear streaks running down his face as he struggled to keep the magical barrier around himself. “No, Roza, you must run!” he cried frantically.  
The jagged armoured one, the woman raised her big sword, glowering at Roza beneath her helm.  
Roza kicked the edge of the round dining table hard, flipping it up and flying towards her opponent.  
The purple skinned creature swung her sword down, cutting through the pine table with ease. Roza ran in at the same time, faster than she had ever moved, willing her muscles to remember what they did best – ending lives. Recklessly, Roza closed in on her target, unleashing Vynna’s dagger across the unarmoured part of the female’s wrist.  
Her hand dropped off and plopped onto the shattered pieced of the dining table. The dark intruder screamed with agony, losing her grip on her serrated greatsword.  
Roza snatched the weapon away from the screaming female; it wasn’t much heavier than her own longsword that she was used to. She turned the blade, thrusting every inch of it through her wailing victim. The teeth of her own greatsword ripped through her own armour, shredding her insides.  
Roza continued to grin manically, pulling the sword up and out, gutting the intruder like a fish. The light in her red eyes flickered, as she gurgled her last breath.  
Her glowing eyed companion looked on with disbelief, his hood falling back to reveal snow-white hair. “Soro!” he shrieked with all the air in his lungs.  
Vay’len was in just as much shock, leaning against the wall as he witnessed the dark, thick blood of the fallen Moriquen shower over Roza.  
The remaining Moriquen turned on Roza with an ominous fury, raising up his green dagger. Roza was ready for him, stepping back and poising the massive sword in her hands. But the attack he sent her way was of the mind. Her limbs went icy cold, a chill filled the kitchen and her eyesight began to fog into darkness.  
Roza began to cackle as if the fight was just starting to get interesting. She anticipated her enemies’ next move – it was the way her blind father had taught her to fight anyway – “Never just rely on your senses, you must know what your opponent will do next, judge how they will attack before they have even made up their own mind,” Theo had always told her.  
She stepped to the right and swung the great-blade across her body, almost blindly slicing her enemies’ neck open. Roza refused to relent, pushing her weight forward to run the Moriquen through. The tip of her weapon slammed into the kitchen wall, smashing tiles frighteningly close to Vay’len.  
The wizard got to work on dispelling the darkness curse, but the intruder was already scampering towards the kitchen door.  
“Where are you going, you bastard?” Roza roared, pulling the borrowed sword out of the wall.  
The darkness and the cold fog in the air dissipated as the Moriquen made his escape and his curse ended.  
Vay’len fell to his knees with exhaustion and despair.  
Still full of blood lust, Roza considered chasing after the assassin, but she spotted her friend clawing at his scalp. Saw how Vay’len’s – and certainly her own greatest fear – had just been realised.  
“I – I didn’t do anything,” Vay’len wept, still clutching his head tightly.  
This must have been how I looked when I lost Joe, Roza realised, remembering the shock that had almost consumed her. I wouldn’t believe it, I willed it to be a dream, there had to be a purpose for it, surely?  
Roza threw down the big Moriquen sword and knelt down in front of Vay’len, forcing his hands down and around his mother’s bright dagger. “I’m sorry I wasn’t quicker,” she uttered.  
He glanced up, but didn’t see the woman before him for quite some time. All he could do was mourn in shock.  
She still steadied his hands, making sure that he held onto the memorabilia of his mother.  
“You saved my life,” Vay’len said eventually, still coming to terms with his loss. For a brief moment, the elf had been forced to accept that his life was about to come to an end. Without Roza, I would indeed be dead…  
Roza bowed her head forwards, pressing her forehead onto his. She knew his pain, as she made a silent prayer for Vay’len’s fallen parents. She knew his pain, all too well.  
He slowly leant into her, resting his forehead against hers, accepting her unconditional comfort. 

Chapter Twenty-Six  
Vigil

Vay’len was in denial.  
Roza could see it in his overly alert eyes, his tightened jaw, as he spoke, “We need to get Jamie back home.”  
“Are you kidding? Vay, we need to give your mother and father a proper burial,” she argued lightly.  
“I don’t know if I can,” he admitted slowly, clinging onto the banister that lead upstairs. He still couldn’t bring himself to look at the carnage behind him and relive the attack.  
“Then, we can take Jamie back and then return here. You can choose some flowers and I’ll handle the rest,” Roza said, standing behind him, treading on the pile of ashes that she was beginning to guess were charred vampire remains.  
Vay’len covered his face with his free hand and began to break down once again. “I’m sorry. I thought I was… I thought I had courage.”  
“I think you’re handling this rather well, actually.”  
“Really?” he glanced back at her with one glassy wet eye.  
Roza nodded and took a shuddering deep breath. “I would have probably thrown myself off a cliff with grief.”  
He put his full weight against the wooden banister, shaking uncontrollably. “Why does it hurt so much?”  
“Love is a strange thing, I don’t think I can explain it,” she replied sincerely.  
Slowly, Jamie descended the stairs and neither Vay’len nor Roza noticed him until he uttered, “What – what happened?”  
“I really can’t explain,” she repeated, “How did they even get past the guards?”  
“Vay’len? Oh gods, are you okay?” Jamie hurried down the last few steps to pat the elf on the arm. “Was this my fault?”  
“No – no,” Vay’len struggled to push out the words. “I think it was mine.”

***

“They had been tracking me for a while. I was a fool to think that they wouldn’t follow me back to my home,” Vay’len continued once the three of them had left the walls of Syl’radin and entered the Pelago forest again. He seemed a little more focused, but still had wild alarm written all over his face.  
On their way out, Roza had swapped the serrated greatsword that the Moriquen had snuck into the city for her own swords, finally feeling whole and complete again. She had felt far too light without them.  
Jamie shook his head. “They wouldn’t have found your family if I hadn’t been so desperate for answers,” he said solemnly.  
“We can’t change what happened, and there is no point blaming yourself,” Roza said, “But I would like to know where that other Moriquen ran off to.”  
“You will see him again, no doubt,” Vay said quietly, “You killed his sister.”  
“Oh good,” she grinned maliciously, “Then at least the bastard can suffer and know the pain that you are going through.”  
They crossed the gentle stream and passed through the dense forest. Even on the way back, Roza recognised nothing and would have been hopelessly lost without her elven guide. It was almost as if the paths, clearings and landmarks moved around – even rocks and tree stumps that she had memorised on the journey seemed to have just disappeared.  
There was something very unique, very special about Rozaline Kiezar, Vay’len pondered as he led the two humans out of Pelago. He glanced back at her tentatively, his eyes tracing over her wicked lips, her calculating eyes – the grinning mask that she almost always hid behind. He was quite confident with a blade, very competent with his spells, yet it hadn’t been enough. When the time came, and it mattered, I froze up, he cursed himself.  
But Roza, she didn’t hesitate for a second, Vay’len realised, glancing back at her again. It made him wonder what secrets the Gardozian zealots knew. For if a young mortal woman could tear apart a centuries old dark elf, what else was she capable of?  
“What is it?” Roza uttered, catching his eye.  
“Nothing,” he fibbed, “I was checking if you were still behind me.”  
“Unusual for me to be this quiet, aye?” she said through grinning teeth. 

***

It was early morning when the trio burst out from the thick forest. Their horses hadn’t wandered far and saddling them up didn’t take long. The ride back wasn’t quite as thrilling as the journey towards Vay’len’s home had been the day before.  
Jamie was glad for a gentler ride, yet he couldn’t stop blaming himself for the death of Vay’len’s parents. He was beginning to become a good friend – a better friend than Belinda Gray, the mage realised as he held on tightly to the back of Roza’s coat.  
They didn’t stop riding until they reached Claylorne’s Innovations, and Vay’len and Roza saw to it that young Jamie was safely reunited with his parents.  
Violet Claylorne was waiting in front of the shop counter, beaming broadly at the sight of her son. Her smile quickly disappeared when she saw how withered the three travellers looked. “What’s wrong?”  
His leg muscles sore from riding, Jamie stumbled forwards into his mother’s arms. “I didn’t see it – I didn’t see it coming,” he whimpered into her shoulder. “If I’d dreamt of what would have happened, I would have stayed here.”  
Violet looked up at Roza and Vay’len, stroking her son’s back. “Are you hurt?” she asked, noticing the dark dried blood that was matted into the captains’ blond hair.  
“We can’t stay long,” Roza said plainly.  
“Is Vic – is father in his workshop?” out of habit, Jamie had to mentally refrain from saying his father’s name.  
“He’s barely left his work,” she nodded.  
Jamie broke away from his mother and turned to Vay’len, “I’m so sorry, Vay’len. If there is anything I can do?”  
“Stay safe,” the elf said stoically before edging his way towards the exit.  
“Don’t beat yourself up,” Roza said quietly, staring straight into Jamie’s eyes. “It wasn’t your fault.”  
She turned away and followed her grieving companion out of the shop.  
Jamie wiped away a tear from his eye and rushed upstairs to find his father. He should have known better than to try barge in to the inventors’ workshop, but the door was locked anyway. He hurriedly knocked three times.  
“Not now,” Victor yelled from inside.  
“It’s me,” Jamie spoke shortly into the keyhole, “Can we talk?”  
After a few seconds of a chair scraping and his father’s metal encased arm clanking, the industrial door flung open. “You came back?” he sounded mildly surprised.  
“You didn’t think I would?” Jamie uttered, his dark eyebrows knitting together with sadness.  
Victor had never been good at reading emotions, not even within his own family. Violet was the expert at understanding and nurturing feelings. Not him, he knew how things worked; cause and effect, puzzle solving and fixing machines were easy compared to people.  
“What reason is there to stay here?” his father asked curtly.  
“For mother, and you,” Jamie replied, his chest tight, his lungs empty of air.  
“What’s happened? Did you lose control again?” he checked.  
“No.”  
“That’s all right, then,” Victor said contently, before returning to his work. 

Chapter Twenty-Seven  
Grief

Rozaline Kiezar spent the whole day digging graves for Vay’len’s parents. Only then, did the weight of what had happened sink into her mind and her bones. She had looked forward to meeting the elven family, to learn more about what made Vay’len so… Vay’len. She understood death, she had grown up around it, the name Kiezar was the epitome for killing-machine. But that still didn’t make the mourning process any easier.  
As the sun began to set over the eternal forest, Vay’len finally returned to his family garden to say goodbye to the loving parents that had raised him. He had gracefully woven together a pair of wicker stars to place over each grave.  
Covered head to toe in soil, Roza helped him add the woven stars into the earth  
“Elves never truly die,” he said after a lengthy silence, staring down at the fresh graves. “Our energy returns to the natural world.”  
Roza didn’t know how to reply to the unusual elven beliefs. Instead, she outstretched her hand to offer him comfort.  
Vay’len laced his fingers with hers, not caring about the dirt, scars and calluses that covered her skin. Roza gave his hand a squeeze, letting him know that she was by his side and there for him, more than words could ever show.  
“To think, just yesterday we were having breakfast together and everything was good,” he muttered, talking down to his knees. “Now, I wish we had never come to visit.”  
“You can’t think like that,” Roza said abruptly. “It could have happened anyway, and you wouldn’t have seen your mother and father at all. Or the city could have been destroyed. You could have died.”  
“You could have died, too,” he countered, turning his head very slightly towards her.  
“I was born to die in battle,” she said, strongly believing her own words. “You have more purpose, you’re so clever and good, you can change things for the better.”  
“No, I refuse to believe that. You’re worth so much more…”  
“I can see it now,” Roza said, so thoroughly convinced, that she didn’t take in his words, “I tried to deviate from my path, I almost got married and had a family, but Gardoz took that away from me. Joe and our unborn child are with Gardoz now, because I still have work to do for my God of War – and I’m going to start by stomping out ever Moriquen that had anything to do with THIS.” She finished by gesturing to the graves she had made, “I won’t be able to do it alone. I will have to protect you, until my dying breath, until your parents are avenged.”  
“I hope you realise how fanatical you sound,” Vay’len said under his breath, barely moving his lips.  
Roza managed a smirk, “I swear it, Vay’len. I will not let any harm come to you. Gardoz has shown me this.”  
“I’m the one who should be offering you a life debt,” he pointed out.  
“Then we will just have to watch each other’s backs. We are partners from now on,” she decided tenaciously, squeezing his hand again.  
“I thought we already were,” he said lightly.  
“Since when?”  
“Ever since I freed you from custody,” Vay’len replied, showing that there was still a proud, yet playful soul behind his grief. That mischievous side, that Roza couldn’t help but adore. 

***

“Do you think it is safe to stay in the city?” Roza wondered, as she and Vay’len walked their horses back into Raydon.  
It was very late at night, the sky clear and full of stars. The streets were empty, citizens tucked up in their beds.  
Vay’len wasn’t fully paying attention, gazing up at the shimmering stars, feeling so very small. The world felt so big and lonely, without his parents to guide him.  
“We might get attacked again,” Roza added. She puzzled for a moment, “Where do you stay? At the University?”  
“I used to,” he replied distantly, his face still tilted upwards, “I’ve been renting a room at the Swordfish ever since the attack though.”  
“Come stay at the guard tower,” she said with a tone that most were wise enough not to argue with. “I can’t imagine my family will be left alone after tonight. I’ll have to get a message to them…” Roza pondered, scratching her bottom lip.  
“I’ll take the horses back to their owner,” Vay’len murmured, gently taking the reins of Roza’s steed, “And give the key to my room back.”  
“That can wait ‘til mornin’,” she argued tiredly.  
But the high elf had already turned to lead the trio of rented horses down a different road.  
She shrugged, too exhausted to follow. Returning to the tower, she pushed on the heavy double doors and climbed the winding staircase to her accommodation.  
Red was waiting for her on the other side of the door, pacing up and down anxiously.  
“You’ll wear a hole in my carpet,” she teased.  
“Roza! Thank Viscar, I thought –” he cut himself off short once he laid his eyes on her, “You look like you’ve been buried alive. What happened?”  
She peeled her soil covered leather coat off and parried his question with another, “How did you get out of the office?”  
“Hölzer,” he said bluntly, his feet gluing to the carpet abruptly, “He’s been searching for you ever since you brought his nephew, Jamie Claylorne home.”  
“Sly old dog, picked the lock on my office, did he?” she snorted, and continued to remove her filthy clothes. “What did Lorne want?”  
“We all thought that you had been captured by dark elves. There was a ransom note pinned to the front door of Silverstone University.”  
“What did it say?”  
“We have your Gardozian. Trade her for the son of Cezar Nailir, or she dies,” Red recited, “That was the best translation that the university scholars could do, anyway. I combed the whole city to find you.”  
“A bluff?” Roza wondered, washing the mud and dried blood from her face at her sink. She shot back up, turning to her companion. “Shit, they are after Vay’len, and I just let him wonder off on his own.”  
Red glanced at her in nothing but her underwear and quickly looked away again, “Would you like me to find him?” he asked shyly.  
“He’s probably at the Swordfish tavern,” she informed, patting her face on a towel.  
Red shot out the door like a bullet, in search of the misplaced elf.  
We have your Gardozian… Roza thought, cleaning her arms before collapsing onto her cosy bed. She lay there, deep in contemplation. So tired, yet she forced herself to stay awake until she saw Vay’len again.  
Who would be mistaken for me? Lillian? She wondered, feeling sick to the stomach of the thought of her sister in the vile hands of a Moriquen. But how would they get to Barass so quickly, to take her?  
The door to her room creaked open and her fingers wrapped around the hilt of the shorter galdarka without a conscious thought.  
“It’s only us,” Red reassured, flattening down his windswept hair.  
“The ransom note is a bit redundant if Rozaline is right here,” Vay’len said, now that Red had caught him up on a few details.  
“You still haven’t told me what happened,” Red pointed out lightly, crossing the room to look out the bedroom window.  
“I killed my first Moriquen,” Roza uttered, looking down at the galdarkas next to her. “The other one got away. That’s what we’re dealing with.”  
“Then it isn’t safe for you here,” Red worried.  
“Someone seems to think that they have already captured Rozaline,” Vay’len agreed, “But it won’t be long until she will be a target again.”  
“It’s you they want,” Roza said, still looking down at the ivory engraved casing of her recently acquired blades. “Which means I fight for you.”  
“It would be far safer if we split up,” he proposed, tilting his head very slightly. “The Tolath family have been at war with mine for hundreds of thousands of years. My grandfather locked them, and all other Moriquen away underground. After Ananette freed them from the sealing magic, I can see why they would want revenge. I don’t want to pull you into this mess.”  
Vay’len pressed his palm against his forehead, weary from his grief. “I just wanted to make this city a safer place, but the attacks keep slipping through and the corruption keeps getting worse.”  
“You sound as though you are about to hand yourself over,” Roza said, glaring up at him from her bed.  
He had never seen her look at him with so much anger and pain. There was true passion in her eyes to die fighting. To die for him. It hurt Vay’len too much to let her throw her life away like that.  
“I’m not giving up,” he said feebly, unable to hold her burning gaze. “I’m just going to drop off the map for a short while. I’ll need your help soon, though, if I may?”  
“Anything. Anything Vay’len,” she vowed.  
“Good,” he nodded, his voice wavering from the agony. The agony of his severely broken heart. “Get some rest.” He threw a glance with his cold blue eyes her way once more, before disappearing out the door.  
Roza sunk her head into her pillow and let her fingers dance over the ivory carvings of the galdarkas. She slept like the dead, with Red watching her door for any trouble.  
When she awoke several hours later, her refreshed mind realised who the Moriquen had mistaken her identity for. It seemed so obvious now – she sprung out of her bed and smashed her palm into her forehead. “The other Gardozian Knight, is Taylor Satza.” 

Chapter Twenty-Nine  
Turquoise Blue

She couldn’t do it. Roza couldn’t let another woman die in her place.  
That means I’m going to need a Vay’len decoy for the hostage swap…  
“I’ll do it,” Red said, as if he was reading the captain’s mind. He passed her a cup of coffee and smiled cheerfully, “I’ll pretend to be Vay’len.”  
“I hope you have a wig to wear,” she mocked, squinting at him mischievously, “And a few inches to grow.”  
“I was thinking my ears were going to be the main problem,” he uttered, tracing the roundness of his ears with his fingers.  
“We should swing by Celeste’s to get something colourful and flamboyant for you to wear,” she suggested, slipping into her own outrageously bleach-white coat.  
“Celeste?” Red puzzled, whilst he wrapped his head up in a dark green scarf, until only his glossy eyes showed.  
“A very wealthy chocolatier.”  
Red recalled his memory, “Scary woman wielding a kitchen knife?”  
“I forgot about that, thanks for reminding me,” Roza chuckled. Her laughter only grew as she turned back to look at her companion. “You look like a leper.”  
“I pretty much am. The slightest bit of sunlight really burns,” he said through the fabric.  
“Let’s be quick, then and keep to the shadows,” she said, heading out of her room. “Moriquen hate the daytime as well. This might be our only chance to save Taylor.”  
“Is he a friend of yours?” he asked, following her out the door, “I mean she?”  
“It’s complicated,” Roza grinned.  
The city had remained dry, and fortunately for Red, thick white clouds blocked out most of the sun’s light. Within a quarter of an hour, they were passing The Swordfish tavern and entering the trade district.  
Red looked at the large water-feature in the centre of the square and then back at Roza. “This brings back memories,” he said boldly.  
“Aye,” she agreed, with a slight smile, “Seems so long ago when I first arrived here.”  
Roza approached Heaven’s Treat and for once the chocolate shop wasn’t horrendously busy. It’s still early in the day, she surmised.  
Red quickly followed his captain inside, and not wanting to cause suspicion, he whipped off his headscarf even faster.  
Roza enviously eyed a few of the patrons having cooked breakfast with hot cocoa, before spotting Celeste sitting behind her lavish sale’s counter.  
The chocolatier raised a delicate eyebrow, “You might as well keep the dress, if you’re going to just keep forgetting to bring it back.”  
Roza grinned charmingly. “Good. I need something for Red to wear, this time.”  
Celeste lowered her voice, “I’m not one to judge…” she looked the young man up and down, picturing him in a ballroom gown. “I might have something that fits.”  
“Just a cloak or a shawl, or something,” Roza said with a chuckle.  
“Oh, right,” she realised the error of her ways and also chuckled. “You know, there is a fine tailor shop across the street, my dear.”  
“Aye, but I like pestering you.”  
Celeste got up from her seat and wagged her finger playfully, “After all I do for you, Ms Kiezar.”  
Roza bowed theatrically before following the chocolatier upstairs to her private rooms.  
“Is he mute, then?” Celeste asked sharply, once they had reached her walk-in wardrobe. She cut Red with an icy look.  
He instantly looked down at the carpet and barely moved his lips, too worried that a long fang might pop out. “I’m the captain’s assistant.”  
“I don’t let him out the office often,” Roza half joked.  
“Ah, I wondered how you were getting all that paperwork done, whilst running around the city, slashing up corrupt guards at the same time.”  
“You heard about that?” it was Roza’s turn to look sheepish.  
“Of course,” Celeste said with mild concern, “As I’ve also heard that a Gardozian Knight has been taken hostage. I was praying all night that it wasn’t you, dear. I suppose you’re planning to save your fellow Gardozian now?”  
“Aye. That’s why we need a disguise.”  
“Something colourful, as your elf partner would wear?” Celeste guessed, turning to her hung up outfits.  
“You’re scarily clever,” Red blurted.  
“I’m going to take that as a compliment, darling,” she purred, not looking away from her most colourful section of clothes. She picked out something turquoise, with an icy blue embroidered trim. It was the most beautiful hooded cloak Roza had ever seen. She realised that the colour matched her father’s blindfolds and his traditional Gardozian armour.  
“Don’t do anything too stupid, dear,” Celeste advised, turning back to the both of them. She handed Red the beautiful garment. “I’ve grown quite fond of you.”  
Roza grinned genuinely. “I’ll be fine.”  
“I didn’t catch your name,” she said, glancing at the captain’s assistant.  
“Michael Zainadir,” he replied nervously, “But people call me ‘Red’.”  
“Why’s that, then?” Celeste wondered curiously.  
He opened his mouth to explain, but Roza’s grabbed him by the elbow and pulled.  
“Let’s go,” she grinned broadly, dragging her assistant away from an embarrassing scenario.  
“Do come back in one piece. I have new truffles for you to try,” Celeste’s musical voice called after them.  
“I wasn’t going to tell her about the nosebleeds,” Red uttered as they descended the dark staircase together. “Honest.”  
Roza sniggered, helping him cover up his face inside the hood of the colourful cloak, before they rushed back onto the streets of Raydon. Red looked wonderfully mysterious and wizard-like beneath the folds of the fancy fabric.  
“Now, you don’t suppose the ransom note had instructions on where to meet, do ya?” Roza wondered.  
“No,” Red shook his hooded head, “But I expect Seth could track them down.”  
“Let’s hope he’s not busy then.”

Chapter Thirty  
The Thief 

She awoke in darkness. She could not move or feel her legs. She tried to cry out, but could not make a sound. Her chest hurt, as if someone was sat on top of her, crushing her lungs. Every breath became a struggle within her living nightmare.  
Taylor Satza lay helplessly on the cold floor, feeling sick and drunk. She had a putrid taste in her mouth, what had happened?  
She tried to move again, but her whole body was paralysed. Where did it all go wrong?  
Am I being punished for all my wrongdoings? She spiralled into despair, tears rolling down her cheeks. Will I ever see daylight again?  
Taylor had lost track of the hours, not knowing if night had become day. All that she knew is that surely she would die soon.  
Sooner than she expected, she heard light footsteps approaching her in the darkness. “Make it quick,” she slurred.  
“Kalya,” a voice whispered, and a glowing orb of blue light appeared above Taylor.  
She panicked, trying to scream, but only a small squeak came out. Her wet eyes went wide, as she stared powerlessly up at the elf that was looming over her.  
He crouched down and put a hand on her shoulder. “I’m going to get you out,” he promised, long silky black hair cascading down his shoulders. “Hold in there, I must drain the poison from you.”  
“Is that why I can’t move?” Taylor managed to murmur, relieved beyond belief.  
He nodded, laying his other hand on her other shoulder, and warmth began to spread down her body.  
“Where are we?” she asked faintly.  
“Deep in a cave, on the outskirts of Cherro,” the elf replied hastily.  
“But that’s miles away from the city…”  
He nodded again and checked the pulse on her neck. “Can you get up?” he encouraged, taking her icy cold hand.  
“I think so,” Taylor said, feeling a little sick and dizzy. Her legs felt heavy, dead weight, but at least she could move them.  
The dark haired, clearly magical elf pulled her off the cold, hard ground, his orb of blue light following them. He led her through a narrow tunnel, which she could barely fit her shoulders through. They made it a few more paces before the valiant rescue attempt was put to an abrupt stop.  
A tall elf stood in their path, with grey skin, lengthy white hair and glowing blood-red eyes. He smiled wickedly, and cutting words poured out in a language Taylor could not understand.  
“Vay’len, son of Cezar, how predictable you are,” taunted the towering Moriquen. “Something tells me that this pitiful creature that we so easily captured, is not the one that killed my Soros. You will tell me where she is.”  
Vay’len threw his orb of light forwards to distract the powerful necromancer, and threw Taylor behind the enemy. “Run!” he ordered.  
Kareth Volthan whipped his long nailed fingers across the dark space in front of him, unleashing a dozen cuts onto Vay’len’s chest. The dark magic burned and seared his flesh.  
“I heard that your father begged until his last breath. I would have liked to have seen that,” he said wickedly, slicing his hand through the air again.  
The magical talons cut down Vay’len’s back this time, causing him to collapse to his knees, and for his glowing orb to snuff out.  
“Being locked away for a millennia really does give one a long time to plan and to watch and savour what I will finally do to the last remaining Nailir,” Kareth promised, “You won’t be so beautiful and righteous when I am done with you.” 

***

Taylor Satza wasted no time following the brave elf’s instruction to run. Trying not to dwell on the fact that he had sacrificed his life for hers, and regretting that she would never know his name, Taylor ran.  
And she ran blindly, hurrying through the damp, pitch black caverns.  
It was an effort to push through the numbness, now that the paralyzing poison slowly left her body. Like sitting crossed-legged for too long and having dead legs, or pins and needles in the feet. Taylor ran, despite how strange it felt.  
She scrabbled through the tunnels, using her sense of touch, rather than her useless eyes, she clawed against the walls until a glow of orange light welcomed her sight.  
Daylight… daylight.  
Taylor rounded the curve of the tunnel and was met by two strangers, both men. One was slim and cloaked in a vibrant shade of turquoise. The other was stockier, his clothes dark and the lamp that he held illuminated his metal vambraces and the crossbow in his hand. There was a woman travelling in between them, a woman that Taylor did recognise.  
“Asha?” she spluttered, wondering if the last hour could get any more bizarre. It had to all be a dream?  
“Aye,” said the captain, relieved to see the lovely young woman in one piece. “How did you escape?”  
“An elf came – ” Taylor panted, struggling to draw breath. She could hear her heart pounding in her ears, “A friendly elf.”  
“Did he have long black hair, by any chance?” the captain asked uneasily.  
“Yes, and pale skin,” she nodded frantically, “he had some sort of magic.”  
“Damn it,” Roza cursed through clenched teeth. I suppose he really meant it when he said; he didn’t want to pull me into this mess, she realised. “Red, can you get Taylor out of here? Take her to the northern Temple of Mear, that we rode past. We’ll meet you there.”  
“Sure,” the young man nodded beneath his vibrant hood, offering his gloved hand to Taylor. “Can you keep running, Miss?”  
“I’ll try,” Taylor said breathlessly, letting the slimmer of the two men drag her out into the open air – the way out.  
“What a mess…” Roza murmured under her breath, before leading on, deeper into the darkness. 

Chapter Thirty-One  
Hold the Line

Vay’len was dragged deeper into the cave by a pair of invisible claws. The stench was foul. Rotting flesh was not an aroma that he had ever prepared himself for. Vay’len gagged, his imagination manifesting the horrors around him. Even his heightened eyesight was lacking in the lightless tunnels. He pictured half decaying bodies, stacks of humanoid bones.  
He could feel the Moriquen poison seeping into his veins, making his whole body heavy and his mind hazy.  
“You have so much potential,” Kareth said hungrily. He sunk the unseen claws deeper into Vay’len’s shoulders. “I could mould you into something truly powerful and wicked.”  
Vay’len barked out with pain, as the Moriquen forced him back down onto his knees, his hands scraping against damp, slimy rock. Trapped inside the cold cavern, Vay’len quaked with fear, dreading what the necromancer would do next. His body had already gone completely numb and limp. Vay’len waited helplessly for the torture to begin.  
“Our people were not so unalike, once,” he continued to belittle his captured wizard. “We lived –” Kareth stopped abruptly, ducking out of the way of a swinging blade.  
Roza’s galdarka swooshed through the darkness and clashed against the narrow passageway, sending sparks onto her foe.  
“There you are, little knight,” he hissed, whirling on her.  
Vay’len tried to cry out a warning, but his tongue and lips were too numb to form words. He wailed from his throat instead as the shadowy claws scratched across Roza’s chest.  
She basked in the pain, charging forwards with another swing. She almost took the Moriquens’ arm off, but he stepped sideways.  
Roza took a step backwards too, sheathing her main galdarka. Unable to see anything at all, she reached out with her other senses to figure out where her enemy was standing. Without any warning, searing pain sliced down her arms. She ignored it, focusing on her form and her technique, ready to strike out like a viper at any second.  
Something made a clicking noise behind her, and a metal bolt soared over her shoulder. Roza guessed that it landed somewhere inside the Moriquens’ body, as he began to scream with rage.  
“To your left,” Seth warned, whilst reloading his crossbow.  
Roza lashed out, severing head from body. Yet she could still hear the necromancer screeching.  
“Get out, there is too many of them,” ordered the bounty hunter, sending another bolt out into the dark tunnel. It was caught by one of the many stampeding vampires, who were all obeying their masters’ summoning.  
“We can’t leave Vay’len,” she argued, slashing her blade in great sweeping arcs to keep back the charging night-hunters.  
“Leave that to me,” Seth roared. He pushed past Roza, throwing her towards the exit with inhuman strength. His battle-cry became less human as well, more feral like a wild beast.  
She had never retreated from a fight before, never left an ally behind, but something was telling her that Seth probably didn’t need any help. If he was transforming into what only her hearing could imagine, Roza was sure she would just be getting in the way of his rampage.  
Roza ran for the exit, cutting down several newly awoken vampires. She made it outside, breathing in the cool evening air. Her eyes adjusted to the light of the moon and the setting sun, examining the slashes that had torn apart her shirt. She was soaked in blood, and it wasn’t long until she was an open buffet for another wave of vampires.  
Rozaline Kiezar held the line, cutting and dashing, slicing and dodging. She couldn’t leave the mountain top, not until she saw Vay’len and Seth again. Even as her body began to weaken, ache and succumb to the Moriquen poison in her veins, she still remained. The massacred bodies of Kareth’s vampire army piled up around her in minutes. They were hungry and blind for her blood, but she refused to give them one drop.  
“Getting tired?” stirred a deep voice, now that the sun had completely gone down.  
Roza recognised him as the pasty Moriquen that had broken into Vay’len’s home and snuffed out Cezar and Vynna Nailir like candles, before fleeing like a coward.  
Roza breathed heavily, deep within the killing calm, barely even registering the blood dribbling out of her. I’ll go down swinging, she decided, charging the elf. To make her body harder to hit, she faced him side on and unleashed her long galdarka.  
It would have cut him down the middle, but the Moriquen lazily held up a black bladed sword to block the blow. He anticipated her off-hand attack as well, drawing his venomous dagger to glance away her strike, just like flicking away a bug.  
As before, the white haired elf summoned a curse to blind her.  
Roza’s eyesight went blurry, before failing her completely. She might as well have been back inside the cave. She didn’t let it stop her from remembering her footwork, letting her muscle memory continue their duel.  
Their blades clashed twice more, pure white Gardozian steel against ancient, jagged metal. How does my father make this look so easy? Roza couldn’t help thinking as she fought for her life, how did Moriquens get to Ayrev anyway?  
Sparks flew from their blades, Roza edged carefully away from her enemy, predicting where his blows would land. She blocked and swerved out of the way of several more flurries from the Moriquen, until her back foot stepped out into thin air. She had run out of mountain ledge, and already knew that the outcome would be fatal.  
Roza stumbled forwards, managing to bash away the sword strike that was careening for her face. The Moriquen caught her on his dagger tip instead, plunging and twisting it in her abdomen.  
An airless grunt escaped Roza’s lips. She had a few seconds to sheath both galdarkas, to keep them intact within their ivory cases. A ritual she had learnt from her training but had never expected to perform; accept defeat. Accept the worthy death.  
Tolath Volthan removed his curse as he sheathed his own blade and picked Roza up by her throat, lifting her over the mountain edge.  
“I want you to gaze upon your killer, and know that my sister was avenged,” he seethed with malice.  
Roza grinned down at him, blood seeping through her teeth. “It was an honour… to serve my God…”  
The Moriquen flung her over the edge, delighting in the kill.  
Wind rushed past her, as she fell from the cliff that Seth had guided her up, less than an hour ago. Roza slammed into a meadow of grass, faster than her mind could comprehend. She heard a snap beneath her, and was sure that it wasn’t a stick.  
She lay in the grass, waiting for Gardoz to take her. She crossed both pairs of swords across her bleeding torso, her lungs empty of air, blood filling her mouth.  
A slow death then… she grinned up at the stars, until her vision blurred into darkness.

Chapter Thirty-Two  
Consort of Death

In a place with no colour, no light or darkness, no air. No pain. Only grey space that reached on and on forever, Roza heard a flutter of fabric and a rasping snarl.  
In a place like this, on her journey to the Underworld, she expected to see her ancestors, men and women with jet black hair, pale skin and the wicked Kiezar grin. The last person she expected to see was Aryn’nair Devarr.  
The Maiyari born llichivar removed his copper mask and snarled again, “What are you doing here?”  
“So I just skipped Pride and Envy, went straight to Wrath?” she asked with amusement. She was still trapped on her back, unable to move. She couldn’t see any blood, only the endless grey. Life is dull without the crimson of blood.  
The endless grey, and the beautiful llichivar, with his pearly skin and dragon-like features hovering over her. “What will I tell your father?” Aryn said, without sorrow or anger in his bright aqua eyes, but cool and calm. As tranquil and relentless as flowing water.  
“That I had a good death,” she uttered.  
“No you didn’t,” he argued, folding his arms so that his long claws curled around his narrow elbows. “You were killed by a single Moriquen. You left Vay’len Nailir in the hands of a powerful necromancer.”  
“You were never this chatty in person,” Roza mocked, grinning up at him.  
“Get up,” the llichivar ordered.  
“I can’t. My spine snapped.”  
“Has that ever stopped a Kiezar from fighting?” Aryn hissed.  
“Probably?” hot tears fell from her eyes, and she wasn’t sure if she was dreaming or if she truly was still alive, talking to her Empress’ consort. “I’m right, aren’t I? There is nothing for me but death? No future…”  
He tilted his reptilian head. “Get up, make your own destiny,” he ordered again. Aryn unfolded his arms and reached out to her with his claws. “You’re tougher than this. Get up, Rozaline. You are Murazian born.”  
To suffer is to be human, she pondered her father’s words, there are worse things than death, but life truly can be wonderful.  
Roza reached out for his hand, and her fingers brushed against something warm and soft. The grey faded away, replaced by stars, clouds and air. Her fingertips stroked across the nose of her hired chestnut stallion, huffing down on her.  
She turned her head to the side to let the blood that had pooled in her mouth dribble out. What a mess, how am I not dead?  
The horse stayed with her, snuffling her hair. She wanted more than anything to get up, ride the beautiful creature back up the mountain and valiantly save Vay’len. My legs don’t work… I’ll never walk again. I’ll never fight again.  
She could almost picture Aryn still perching beside her, ordering her to get up. A broken scream escaped from her as she tried so very hard to move her legs. Her brain told her legs to lift her up, she could visualise it, but nothing could change the fact that she was paralyzed from the waist down.  
Roza reached up to grab the reins that dangled from the stallion’s neck. Where the fuck are you, Seth? She damned him, the bastard could have told me that he was a fucking werewolf. She held onto the leather strap in her hand, taking in shuddering breaths. The grass around her was stained with her blood.  
Get up, get up, get up.  
Roza roared with rage and pain, trying desperately to pull her body up onto the horses’ shoulders. She couldn’t pull up with one hand and keep her insides from falling out with her other, plus carrying four swords was too heavy. She let go of the blades and ripped the arm off her coat and tied it around her torn apart abdomen with difficulty, before trying to drag her broken body up onto the truly loyal horse.  
Come back for the swords, she promised her guilty conscience, her top half draped over the stallion’s shoulders, this will have to do.

***

The chestnut horse was stained with the captain’s blood by the time he reached the Mear temple to join his two dapple grey mares. It was lucky that Red no longer needed to sleep. It was a curse that he could smell blood even through thick brick wall, crave it and hunger for it. Red rushed outside, covering his mouth with his vibrant sleeve.  
“Roza,” he gaped with dismay. “Rozaline, can you hear me?”  
She spat blood down onto the grass around the ancient temple and tried very hard to grin through her agony. “Have they… come… back?” she choked the words out.  
“No,” he panicked, reaching out to put his icy fingers around his captain’s face and support her almost lifeless head. “No.”  
“I…” more thick blood dribbled from Roza’s mouth. This is it, this is the end. “…must go back.”  
“You’re whiter than a sheet,” he began to weep, lifting her off the horse with his incredible vampiric strength. Her body draped limply across his arms, “There’s so much blood.”  
“It’s okay,” she rattled, trying to reach up and touch his face. Her hand felt so heavy. Her whole body felt so heavy.  
Red fell down, cradling the fierce warrior in his lap. His tears pattering on her face, “What do I do? Tell me what to do.”  
“Let me… join you,” she decided, struggling for breaths.  
“You’d become the very thing that your order destroys,” he reminded her. “The hunger never goes away, Roza. You’ll never see the sun again. Is it truly what you want?”  
“I want to… run again,” she struggled between her laboured breathing. “Vay needs me… my family… you need me?”  
“Of course I need you,” he sobbed, “But I’ll be condemning you to an immortal life.”  
“There are… worse things,” she grinned through the pain, using the last of her strength to brush her fingers across Red’s lips.  
He lightly kissed her fingertips and stroked her wrist. Red had spent so long shutting off the instinct to find a beating pulse and sink his fangs into it. He had eaten nothing but raw animal meat for weeks and weeks, but he still never felt sated. Always the unquenchable thirst.  
Roza’s pulse was slowing. He brushed his lips along the veins on her wrist. “Are you sure?” he checked, even though he wasn’t certain if he could hold back his urge, not when he was this close.  
“More than anything,” she replied, bracing for the pain.  
But Red was tender and gentle, planting kisses on her wrist before sinking his fangs in. A mild scratch against her skin, a small amount of pain before the pleasurable sensation of Red’s tongue lapping up her blood.  
She moaned softly, the top half of her body writhing slightly.  
His eyes darted up to her face with concern, and hunger and lust. Red wasn’t sure if he was going to be able to stop himself from tasting her. So beautiful, so strong, he had never known such arousal. He wanted Roza, every part of her, every inch. She was half dead, and all Red could think about was biting her, and drinking her and screwing her. He managed to pull away from her wrist, ashamed of his thoughts.  
Roza’s body began to convulse on his lap, whilst choking noises emitted from her throat.  
Red couldn’t help but brush his finger along the bite marks on her wrist, licking up the last few drops, savouring the sweet taste. He stroked her head, waiting for her to come around. To join him as a creature of the night.  
A few moments dragged by, Roza slipped down into the grey again, hearing ancient whispers from an unknown origin. But there were no ghosts to greet her, or half-living llichivar to encourage her back. There was only emptiness. No Underworld to take her, no Hall of Heroes to honour her achievements. Nothingness. Just the curse of a never ending existence.  
She came back to the physical world, spluttering and clutching her makers' turquoise cloak. “How do you feel?” Red asked.  
“Angry. And thirsty,” she said, her eyes glowing red briefly before turning green again. The wound in her gut began to seal up, her spine snapped back into place with a horrifying crack. Roza slid off his lap and managed to stand on her feet again, adjusting to her new senses. The night felt welcoming, her vision was better than ever, her sense of smell was pin-point. The gashes on her arms healed up as well, but the bite marks on her wrist still remained.  
“Time to get my swords back,” she said, stretching her arms over her head. “Take care of this horse, he saved my life.”  
“Or just ruined it,” Red uttered, still kneeling in the grass, staring up at the terrifying warrior. The taste of fresh blood lingering on his tongue.

Chapter Thirty-Three  
Reborn

Roza sprinted on freshly healed legs, the night air kissing her perfect skin. She was alert, more alive than ever, she grinned to herself as she hurried to the bottom of the rocky mountain to collect her swords. She stooped down in the grass, surprised by the amount of blood that she had left there. Blood that she had no desire to drink.  
A part of me died here…  
Roza strapped her weapons back onto her belt and began to climb the steep mountain path. She was faster and far stronger than before, her changed body ceased to tire.  
Her acute ears picked up on the snarls and shrieks near the top of the path. She spotted Seth first – or whatever was left of the man – his hulking, wolf-form tore into the never ending army of savage vampires.  
Crawling along the floor, fighting the poison in his veins, Vay’len struggled to escape. The werewolf protected him as one of his own, taking blows from the withered vampires. He retaliated with massive claws and a gnashing jaw, exploding the undead creatures into pieces.  
Roza found it hard to believe that her father and his fellow Gardozian knights had once been tasked to defend the Viel Wall from hordes of terrifying werewolves. One wrong move against a feral beast like that would have ripped her father apart… No wonder he is so unhinged.  
She rushed over to pick Vay’len up and help him flee from the carnage. His beautiful blue and green cloak was in ribbons and stained with his blood, his back shredded to pieces by the dark necromancer.  
“You look like shit,” Roza said, tilting her head to the side, grinning wildly.  
His body was dead weight, but she managed to hold him up right and help him walk down the rocky pathway.  
“What happened?” Vay’len croaked, looking down at the crusted blood that covered her shirt.  
“I’m not quite sure myself,” she replied wittily. “Did you know Seth was all fur and claws?”  
“I’m as surprised as you are,” he uttered. His fingers tightened around her waist as the numbing poison ebbed away, and it became less of an effort to drag his feet along.  
“Did he get that Moriquen necromancer?” Roza checked, steering her companion well away from her blood pile.  
“No,” Vay’len said, exhaustion gripping him.  
“What were you thinking going off on your own?” she chided, “I’m the one that is meant to be reckless.”  
“I didn’t expect… Kareth to be here.”  
“It’s a good thing Seth is literally a sniffer dog and found you in time,” she grinned. Up ahead, she could see the northern Temple of Mear clearly. Her eyesight was even perfect enough to see the stallion that had saved her, taking a deep drink from a bucket of water.  
Vay’len’s legs began to wobble as they reached the gate, that led into the rose garden. Mear’s sacred grounds.  
“We’re nearly there,” Roza encouraged, the soldier in her continuing to crutch her ally. She hurled Vay’len towards the open door of the temple, breathing in the fragrance of lavender and rose petals that lined the goddesses’ altar. Gifts for the deity of love and beauty.  
Taylor was sat in front of a rose tinted mirror with a priestess, clad in magenta silken robes. They shared a cup of pink wine together, calming their nerves from the horrors of the night.  
“Was Seth with you?” the priestess asked, looking up at the bloody pair of survivors. She was beautiful, as all Mear priestesses were, even with the worried look on her face.  
“Uhm, yeah,” Roza puzzled, still holding the elf at her side upright. “Friend of yours?”  
The priestess smiled, but her eyes still showed worry, “An old friend, yes.”  
“Will ya take care of Vay for me? I’ll go find Seth,” she said.  
Taylor stared up at the captain with her eyes wide, her lips parting slightly but not uttering a word. Roza could tell that the Barassian thief was in complete shock.  
“No need,” a gravely voice spoke from the entrance of the temple. Seth stepped inside the candlelit room, sporting a nasty gash across his shoulder, his clothes tattered beyond repair.  
The priestess jumped up, rushing past Roza and Vay’len to meet with Seth. He bowed his head down until their foreheads were pressed against each other.  
“Careful, he bites,” Roza teased, before spotting a room with a bed inside to rest her friend down.  
“Why aren’t you at home, Carrie?” Seth asked gently, pulling away slightly to look deeply into the priestess’ eyes.  
“I’ve left Francis,” she replied, “I don’t want to be his property, I can’t stand another day of it.”  
“But you had a roof over your head. Nice things, expensive clothes, wholesome meals… I can’t give you anything,” he said with sorrow.  
“You big fool. None of those things bring me happiness,” Carrie smiled sweetly. She caressed his cheek and kissed his lips softly.  
A kiss Seth had waited almost a decade for. He went limp for a moment, before holding Carrie tightly with his uninjured arm.  
“I won’t let Francis take you away from me again,” she promised, tears welling up in her eyes. “I want to be with you.” 

***

Roza carefully peeled away Vay’len’s blood soaked robes and shirt, before cleaning the gashes on his back with fresh water.  
He sat on the edge of the bed, holding his head in his hands, wincing with every gentle dab of the wrung out cloth. What was I thinking? I wasn’t thinking…  
“Do you have any medicine?” Roza wondered, once she was done with the water. Vay’len’s blood had turned the water pink, something primal within her told her to take a sip. She battled the urge within her, striving to be moral.  
“I used it all up on your back,” his reply was muffled from within his palm. “I’ll have to make some more.”  
“Ironic,” she sniggered. “I’m going to need to stitch you up. Do you want me to get you some wine to ease the pain?”  
Vay’len hesitated, not knowing what he wanted at all anymore. “Yes, please.”  
Roza left the small bedroom, searching the temple for a needle and thread, as well as the bottle of the pink wine she already knew about. She bumped into Taylor on her way back to the room.  
“Thanks for saving me,” the thief finally spoke up. “Twice now, I owe you my life.”  
Roza loomed over her, somehow an added presence of darkness wrapped around her. Never ending life… Never living death…  
“I’m sure we can find a way for you to make it up to me,” Roza said with a wink, yet her heart wasn’t fully in it. Not after what she had been through tonight. Losing to a Moriquen, only proved how right her father had been. She still wasn’t ready; not ready to be a true Gardozian Knight. “Have you seen Michael?”  
“Who’s Michael?” Taylor asked.  
“He probably told you his name was Red.”  
“Oh, that guy,” she chuckled lightly. “He said something about having to return his lovely cloak back to a chocolatier. I think that is what he said, anyway. We were both a bit overwhelmed by the attack, mentally and physically.”  
“Why would he go in the middle of the night?” Roza wondered aloud, before retuning to tend to Vay’len’s wounds.  
Handing him the bottle of wine, Roza rejoined him on the edge of the bed, where he turned his slender back to her again for her to stitch together his mutilated body.  
The elf let out a sharp intake of breath as soon as she began.  
“I’m being as gentle as possible,” she said defensively.  
“I know, but your hands are freezing,” Vay’len shivered.  
“Sorry,” she smirked. “Drink your wine, that will warm you up.”  
After a few of the gashes had been sealed up and Vay’len had drunk several sips of wine, he leant over into his hand again. “I don’t know what to do,” he admitted.  
“You just need to rest and have a proper meal,” she teased, now that their roles had somehow switched.  
“I’m completely alone now, the only remaining Nailir, yet… I didn’t care if I lived or died to protect this city and its people,” he continued quietly.  
“Oh no, it sounds as if you’re actually becoming more human, Vay,” she teased relentlessly.  
“I don’t know how you do it. To lose who you love most, and still get out of bed in the morning?” Vay’len said, close to tears. There was an empty spot in his chest, where his parents had once filled it with warmth. “What do I do?”  
“You never give up,” Roza replied, pitying him completely.  
“It was foolish. I was foolish. I could have got you all killed, for what? My own pride?” he reflected sadly.  
Maybe this isn’t the right time to tell him that I did technically die, Roza thought quickly, tying off the final stitch.  
He glanced over his shoulder at her, “Aren’t you going to say something witty?”  
“Do you want me to?” she suppressed the grin that was threatening to creep across her face. She wasn’t sure if she had long fangs now or not, best not scare him.  
“It’s usually how our conversations go. I find the familiarity comforting.”  
“I thought it just made me sound like an asshole,” Roza said impishly.  
Vay’len took another sip from the wine bottle, wincing as he turned his back towards the headboard of the small bed. “I won’t deny, or confirm that statement,” he attempted to tease her back.  
Roza glanced down at his bare, well-toned torso, before looking back up and almost losing herself in his sorrowful, sapphire eyes.  
“I’ve never felt so tired before,” he uttered.  
“When did you last sleep?”  
“I thought I told you, elves don’t sleep,” Vay’len replied with a crooked smile.  
“Yeah-yeah, reverie-thing, whatever.”  
“Sometime before we ‘kidnapped’ Jamie,” he realised.  
“A lot has happened since then,” she pointed out. Roza moved into the centre of the bed, sitting crossed legged. She didn’t feel tired at all, quite the opposite in fact; she felt hyper alert.  
“Never the less, it is still dark outside and Kareth might come back for me,” he worried.  
“I’ll guard your door. I’m a good little guard dog,” she said with a half grin.  
Vay’len scooted forward on the mattress, wrapping his arms around her, pressing his pointed ear against her cheek. “Thank you,” he murmured.  
“Woof,” she murmured back. She became hyperaware of how warm his body against hers was, how loud the pulse in his neck was, thudding in her ears. How easy it would be to sink her teeth into his soft flesh…  
Roza quickly recoiled from Vay’len, shutting down her new lust for blood.  
His eyebrows curved high, worried that he had crossed a line of intimacy with her. “I forget, you’re not really a hugger,” he said apologetically.  
“It does conflict with my Gardozian training a little bit,” she jested, before springing off the bed. “Get some rest.” 

Chapter Thirty-Four  
Judgement 

Daylight could be a problem, Roza realised, as dawn became day and for once the skies of Ayrev were not covered with clouds.  
Vay’len awoke from his trance-like state, slid out of the borrowed bed and slung his satchel bag over his bare shoulder. He packed his ruined robe before straightening up, it had been a gift from his mother and another thing that the Moriquen menaces had taken from him  
“Shall we head back to the city for some breakfast?” he suggested.  
Roza wasn’t sure how to break it to her friend, normal food is wasted on me now. She leant up the doorframe, where she had stood guard all night, gazing out into the temples’ worship area.  
“Rozaline?” he called her back from her thoughts.  
“I need to find Michael,” she replied. For some reason she felt lost without him, the man that had given me another chance at life, his fang marks still imprinted on her wrist. A bond that went deeper than words or wishes ever could. “You should stay with Seth, he can keep you safe.”  
Vay’len couldn’t figure out why her mood had turned so icy. “Okay. You must be tired, standing there all night? I’ll find somewhere safe for Taylor to recover.”  
“Thanks, Vay,” she forced a smile and watched him leave.  
Coward, just tell him, her own thoughts mocked her. But the Eladrin was already gone.  
Roza eventually stepped out into the prayer room, wandering up to the long, flower adorned Mirror of Mear. “Huh, I guess vampires have reflections, after all,” she mused under her breath. Considering the night she had endured, she didn’t look too rough. She fixed her hair in front of the ancient mirror, psyching herself up to go outside and live with her consequences of an immortal life.  
A terracotta plant pot slid off the windowsill to her left, smashing soil onto the stone floor. “Alright-alright, I’m leaving,” she spoke up to the goddess of the arts. It was unwise for a zealot of Gardoz to linger in the house of other gods.  
The sunlight outside was blinding. She held her hand in front of her eyes, and the heat against her skin quickly became unbearably hot. Roza rushed to her trusty horse, lifting her bloodstained jacket over her head for a bit of shade.  
The stallion huffed deeply through his nostrils, happy to see his most eccentric rider back on her feet.  
Her blood had crusted across his neck and shoulders, staining his beautiful chestnut coat. “I’ll give you a good brush down once we’re back in the city,” Roza said, buckling the saddle up beneath him. She didn’t bother with a bridle, climbing into the saddle and letting the majestic creature choose the route back to Raydon.  
Even on the back of a horse, Roza felt sluggish and slow in the daylight. She wanted more than anything to climb into her bed and hide under her covers.  
The horse and its rider slowed at the gates of the city. They began to trot towards the barracks, where her guards were waiting for her, standing in a ring, holding loaded rifles.  
“What’s going on? I thought y’all wanted sword training?” the captain wondered.  
They all began to raise their guns in unison.  
“Hold up,” Roza froze in her saddle, “Can ya let my horse go? Do what you want with me, but this horse deserves better.”  
None of the guards seemed to object. They took a step back from her though, they had seen their captain fight, and they knew how far her sword reach was. But have they really seen me in action?  
“We’ve been ordered to escort you to the palace,” one of her brave guards spoke up.  
“All twenty of you? I’m honoured,” she grinned wickedly.  
She began to move, out of curiosity more than anything, taking refuge behind the shadows of Raydon’s largest buildings. Again, her guards were wise enough not to shove her or get too close. None of them knew how tired their captain really was or how burning the sunlight was for her.  
The palace gardens were beautiful, but Roza could only squint to see. She had grown up on ships and the deserts of Barass, but nothing had ever been as exhausting as walking through sunlight for the first time as a night hunter. She thought she might pass out from the heat.  
Thankfully, her guards led her inside a back entrance to the Hollington palace. Having a roof over her head was as refreshing as cold water splashing onto dehydrated skin.  
“Are you sure this is her?” asked a palace guard, dressed in a fancy green uniform. He looked her up and down with scrutiny, her shredded and blood stained clothes hardly making a good first impression.  
“Look, whatever I did, whoever I did, I can promise you that I wasn’t sober,” Roza said with a wild grin.  
“Take her weapons,” he ordered.  
The city guards hesitated.  
“I’m a Gardozian follower, you have no right to disarm me,” she argued, the smile quickly vanishing from her face.  
The palace guard lost his temper. He was a big man, who was most likely used to getting his own way and viewed women, rather than listened to them. He struck out, wrapping his rough hand around Roza’s throat and slamming her into the side of the entrance passage.  
By reflex, she smashed her palm into the base of his jaw and he recoiled from her, clutching his stinging face. “Tie her up!” he ordered angrily.  
Roza had two options. Surrender, or kill all of her own men. Good men who had families and that were only following orders that were higher up than her own.  
She chose the former, tucking her hands behind her back to let them cuff her.  
Roza was escorted deeper into the palace, down a flight of stairs and then through basement passageways. The dust and the musty smell told her that the underground rooms were rarely used, and she half expected to meet another vampire in the dark, cool depths of the palace.  
Instead there was a woman awaiting them, tall and lean with her auburn hair cut short. She lay casually across a long sofa, the light from the small fireplace behind her haloing the room with warm light. The woman stuffed the rest of her toast into her mouth and washed it down with her cup of coffee, before gesturing to the dining chair that was placed ominously in the middle of the room.  
The big palace guard, with his jaw still throbbing, shoved Roza down into the chair and began to bind her ankles to the wooden legs and her wrists to the armrests. “I’m told that this is her,” he informed the woman, before dismissing the city guards.  
She got up slowly from her seat, observing Raydon’s captain. “I’ve heard that there is a certain glint that Kiezar’s have in their eyes,” said the important woman, swaggering over to meet her prisoner. She took a hold of Roza’s chin, her nails digging into her skin and gazed deeply into those Kiezar eyes.  
Roza grinned wickedly, her eyes tilting up to examine the woman in return, to memorise every detail before claiming the kill.  
“There it is,” the woman mused nonchalantly, “The insanity that runs deep within your bloodline. There is no place for your kind in our new world.”  
Roza continued to grin, “Belinda Grey, I presume?” the woman met Seth’s and Jamie’s description perfectly.  
The Raven leader ignored her, scoffing at the sight of four swords on the captain’s belt. “Such obsolete weapons,” she mocked, “What good are traditions and the gods? All they do is bring about wars and monsters. Take your empress and her llichivar pet for instance, her whole family has been nothing but a curse since they claimed the northern countries with fire and blood. A pest that not even Krotan and Zula could eradicate, and now the Moriquen are taking their time…”  
“Don’t tell me that you’re startin’ a new cult,” Roza grumbled.  
Belinda whipped her hand away, leaving scratch marks on the captain’s chin. “I’m beginning a revolution, girl. You killed many of my men. Falco and his guards deserved better than the butchering that you performed.”  
“It’s all I know,” she admitted.  
“I know,” she uttered, standing tall with a hand on her hip, “Your family made you this way and for that, I almost pity you.”  
Roza tilted her head, her grin growing more crooked, “Whose royal dick are you sucking to get you a room inside the palace?”  
“Such a brash tongue,” Belinda said, her voice remained calm but her eyes filled with fury.  
“Want me to cut it out?” the big palace guard offered with enthusiasm.  
“Not just yet,” she held up a hand. “We’ll let Gus decide what to do with her.”  
“In the meantime, how about you tell me more of your elaborate, evil schemes?” Roza teased.  
“I think not,” Belinda said, settling back onto her sofa and holding her narrow chin high. “Instead you will tell me which of my Ravens has betrayed me, or my man Lucio here will smash out all of your teeth.”  
“I don’t know any of your Ravens. I didn’t leave any of them alive long enough,” Roza taunted wickedly.  
Belinda’s nails dug deep into the leather arm of her sofa.  
Lucio struck her hard in the face, toppling the wooden chair backwards. Roza’s head slammed against the stone floor and she began to laugh, filling the underground room with her husky voice, “You hit like a little bitch.”  
The guard pulled her and the chair upright, before storming towards the fireplace.  
Roza couldn’t see what he was doing behind the sofa, but he soon re-emerged with a searing hot, bird shaped brand.  
“Now we’re talkin’,” Roza purred, blood dribbling from her split nose.  
Lucio stormed back to his victim, ripping the sleeve off her shirt, the same arm that she had removed her jacket sleeve to use a tourniquet. Without even a moment of mercy to let her brace for the burn, he pressed the red-hot metal against Roza’s shoulder.  
She clenched her teeth and strained every muscle in her body, determined not to cry out in agony.  
“Most men weep when they are brandished with the raven,” Belinda noted, “Gardozians really are made of tougher stuff. No matter, you belong to me now. Tell me who has been relaying messages to Lorne Hölzer?”  
Roza kept her lips tight, breathing heavily through the searing pain and the smell of her own cooked flesh.  
“I hear he has a pretty daughter. It would be a shame if something happened to her,” Belinda threatened as if she was ordering a main course from a menu.  
Without thinking, Roza tried to jump out of her seat and cut the woman’s head off. The chair she was tied to skidded across the floor by a few inches as she fought against her bonds.  
“Touched a nerve there, did I?” she mused.  
In that moment, a man and his three bodyguards ducked through the small doorway and met with the Raven leader.  
Roza recognised the well dressed man as Prince Gustav Hollington, King Varghese’s youngest brother. He was well built as well, trained to fight for his country. He loomed over the captain, rocking back onto he heels briefly, “Why couldn’t you have just continued to drink and fuck your way into an early grave?”  
She raised her eyebrows, not expecting such vulgarity from a prince. She peered around him to give Belinda a knowing look, “So it’s the youngest one that you spread your legs for?”  
Gustav rocked forwards and struck her across the cheek.  
“Oh, he has soft hands at least,” she grinned.  
“Don’t act innocent in all of this,” the prince demanded, “You stole from my beloved sister, you took away what was most dear to her and shattered her heart.”  
“Which sister? I have quite a hazy memory,” Roza said playfully.  
The prince struck her again, this time with his ring covered fingers.  
“Well, that isn’t helping me to remember,” she protested, the metallic taste of blood filling her mouth.  
“Of all the men in Raydon, you have to choose the one that Melody is infatuated with,” he accused.  
“What? Vay’len?” Roza checked before throwing her head back with laughter. “I think there has been a misunderstanding. The pair cooled things off with each other, y’know as one is a human, and the other bein’ an elf.”  
“I have no cares for what he is,” Gustav seethed, “I’ve had to endure my sister never leaving her room and neglecting to eat or talk with us.”  
“And you want someone to blame for that, other than her own poor choice of falling in love with an immortal elf?”  
“You’ve just made the biggest mistake of your life,” he said with cold rage, “At sunrise tomorrow, you will die for treason. The firing squad will line up and there will be nothing left of you for your worthless family to recognise.”  
“Is that it, then?” she smiled playfully, “No trial?”  
“Did you show Belinda’s men a fair trial before cutting them apart?” he retorted.  
“Admittedly, no, but they did threaten to shoot me on two different occasions. Let’s just call it self-defence, aye? If you’re really going to have me killed because I helped my friend – I’m really emphasising on friend here – get out of an awkward situation, then I don’t really know who the bigger fool is. You, or me?”  
“You’re getting in the way, more than anything,” he glared. “I wouldn’t want to inflate your ego more. But once you and that elf are gone, we can get Jamie back and continue to make this country something to be proud of again.”  
“Ah, you have the same fascination as your father with magic, I see?”  
“I’m nothing like my father. He was a weak coward,” Gustav snapped, turning on his heel to leave.  
“Aye, ‘cos there is nothin’ braver than lettin’ your men shoot me to death, instead of challengin’ me yourself,” she taunted.  
“Don’t listen to her,” Belinda said with disgust.  
“Why would I play by your rules? All you know is how to swing a sword. If you really like, I can line up with the rest of the guards and put a bullet in your head,” he said, looking back at her as if he had dirt on the end of his nose.  
“That would be an honour,” Roza chuckled.  
“Until then, I’ll let these four men have some fun with you. I would join them, but I just don’t know where you’ve been,” the prince grimaced before departing from the room.  
“Are you going to stay and watch, Belinda?” Roza purred mischievously.  
“Alas, I have errands to run,” she got up again and swaggered over, relieving the captain of her swords. “When you decide to tell me who the snitch is, you can have these back. I’m sure that’s one of your silly traditions to die with your weapons, isn’t it? I can oblige, if you wish? Now, what was that flower girl called again? Holly? No, Haley…”  
“Stay away from her,” Roza barked, the rage waking up within her again.  
Belinda laughed under her breath as she sauntered away with Roza’s most prized possessions. Once she was gone, the four guards began to tear into her clothes like a pack of wolves.  
Roza didn’t care what happened to her, she was numbed by the fact that her swords were gone and that her friends were now in danger. She struggled in her bonds, eventually smashing the legs off the chair beneath her.  
Lucio caught her by the throat again, pinning her to the stone floor. She was sure he would have relished in choking her to death, if she was still mortal.  
“We’ll see who tires first, shall we?” she managed to choke the words out.  
“For once in your life, shut up,” he ordered, shoving a scrap of her shirt into her mouth. He sat on top of her ribcage to stop her from writhing around.  
With her wrists still awkwardly strapped around the chair, his weight crushing down on her chest and the other three palace guards taking it in turns to hold her thrashing legs down, Roza had no control at all. She was completely powerless for the first time in her life, just a tool for the four men to gratify their wicked whims.  
But her father had prepared her for the worst – the worst that this cruel world could offer – “If you’re ever in a trapped situation, if someone is wronging you, you focus on their eyes. Ya hear me? Remember their eyes, and know that you will one day claim them.”  
As she laid there, her body continually beaten and violated, Roza stared up at her abusers, watching and memorising their eyes with an eerily calm expression on her face.

Chapter Thirty-Five  
Visions

After a full day of bonding with his father, Jamie Claylorne settled down for the night. If I can even call working in silence in the same room together ‘bonding’, he thought, closing his thick curtains across his window. But at least father can tolerate my company now.  
He flopped down on his bed, pulling a book that Vay’len had gifted to him onto his lap. He devoured the words within, learning more and more about magic and the ways in which it worked. He read until he could no longer keep his eyes open, popping his spectacles onto his bedside table and switching off his gas lamp.  
Jamie soon began to dream, and as always his dreams were lucid, colourful and full of deeper meaning. For the first portion of his vision, everything he saw seemed to travel backwards. He watched a ship sail across the sea in reverse, as if the wind was dragging the sails instead of pushing them. Blood soaked the whole deck, torn apart bodies piled up the gangway.  
He began to travel through the air, as if his body was in the mind of a bird, soaring back towards dry land. A trio of horses galloping across a green field, again their legs went backwards, and so too did the clouds above. The cycle of day to night went backwards as well, the sun set in the east and arose again in the west.  
Jamie was planted in the middle of a busy street, everyone around him walked backwards, except for a young woman selling flowers. They were technically cousins, though they had barely ever spoken to each other before. A feeling of dread went through him, and he reached out for her, mouthing her name.  
His vision froze for a second, before carrying on, moving forward in time once again. The sun rose in the east at last, and from the outskirts of Raydon city, a multitude of rifle shots thundered up into the sky. He tracked his way to the point, finding a line of guards and Belinda Grey overseeing the public execution.  
“You are charged with high treason,” she announced, her voice echoing within Jamie’s mind. “Have you any final words?”  
“Gardoz sends his regards,” Rozaline Kiezar grinned broadly, standing proudly before the line of rifles. A moment later, and her body was filled with a dozen bullets.  
Jamie awoke abruptly, unable to hold onto the vision any longer. He rolled out of his bed with urgency, whipping open his curtains. To his dismay, it was mid morning. Like always, his unusual dreams were always extended, as if he had lived for a whole lifetime, only to return to his adolescent body again by morning.  
He held his head in his hand, regaining his breath and waiting for his heartbeat to steady. “What have you done?” he uttered.  
“Jim!” his mother called from the kitchen, “breakfast is ready!”

***

Jamie barely managed to eat his breakfast, or even his lunch. He knew that what he had seen in his dream had already happened, I was too damn late…  
Outside Claylorne’s Innovations, rain poured heavily against the shop windows. The grey clouded skies reflected Jamie’s gloomy mood. It wasn’t until evening, when the city streets were flooded with rain water, that Vay’len came to visit the establishment.  
The elf arrived with a bruised chin, a tender back and a stack of fresh books for his young friend.  
“A bit of light reading,” he joked as Jamie led him up to his bedroom. “You look a bit shaken, is there something wrong?”  
Jamie sat down in his chair by the window, tucking his knees under his chin. Dark circles shadowed his vibrant green eyes as he looked up at the towering elf.  
“You don’t know?” he uttered glumly.  
“Evidently not,” Vay’len puzzled, resting the stack of books down on the bedside table.  
“Roza is dead,” said the sightseer, letting the fact sink in for a moment, “In front – in front of a firing squad.”  
“But I saw her yesterday,” he continued to puzzle, rather than believe the painful truth. “How…”  
“The Ravens have been working for Gustav Hollington for years – but I’ve only just seen it in a vision now. Not even Roza’s own guards could disobey the orders of a prince,” Jamie said, his eyes wide as if he was watching them brutalise Roza in his hallway. “You can’t stay here. They want your head as well.”  
“But – but she didn’t do anything wrong,” Vay’len stumbled over his words and his own feet, slumping down on the end of Jamie’s bed.  
“The prince saw you two together at the spring ball, he knew that his sister was in love with you,” Jamie stated. There was no point in hiding the details to spare Vay’len the pain of knowing. He owed his mentor the truth.  
It was all my fault… Vay’len sat with his hand covering his mouth, so sure that he was going to be sick. He could only stare down at his knees, it was just a kiss. A fatal kiss.  
“I’m sorry, Vay’len,” he muttered, a tear rolling down his face, “I’ve been nothing but a bad omen to you. You should leave Ayrev. There is nothing here for you but death.”  
“You’ve seen that, too?”  
Jamie nodded, “Only if you stay.”  
“I’ve never sailed before,” Vay’len realised, “I’ve never left this island.”  
“It won’t be the last time you sail, either. Claynore will need you to defeat the Moriquen, the Empress will need you to restore her lands. Perhaps you’ll even meet Diana Hölzer, and finally come back to me with some answers about my gifts,” Jamie foretold, trying his best to be optimistic. The future was always changing, and he was eager to look on the brighter side.  
“First, I feel as though I owe Rozaline’s family… they should know,” he said, struggling to swallow. He was still grieving for the loss of his parents, and it was so easy to let the misery take over.  
“There will be a ship leaving for Barass tonight,” Jamie informed, drying his face on his sleeve. “I’m so sorry, my dear friend.”  
“It was never your fault,” Vay’len said, struggling to compose his emotions and rise to his feet. “I appreciate your sympathies.”  
Jamie was relieved to hear the words. He uncurled his legs and watched the Eladrin leave, wishing that they would see each other again on more fortunate terms.  
Vay’len Nailir made it to the end of the of the puddle soaked street, passing the smithy that Roza’s uncle owned. For once the fires of the forge were put out and a sign on the door read; Closed for paternity leave, thank you for your patience.  
Vay’len could hardly put a damper on the miracle of new life, one that Roza hadn’t lived long enough to witness. He was sure that news would soon spread that the captain of the guard was dead.  
She was dead.  
It sunk in a little bit deeper with every passing minute, until Vay’len was clutching the brickwork of the smithy just to remain upright. He was fortunate that he was a wizard and not a mage, otherwise all of his pain and anger would have exploded out of him in a fiery heat-wave. To be a successful wizard, it took years of balancing and focusing the mind, but right now he was falling apart.  
What was the last thing that I said to her?  
He thought back to how she had stitched up his wounds inside the sweet smelling Mear Temple, and they had teased each other as if tomorrow would never come. And he had embraced her. They had shared each other’s burdens and sorrows over the past months.  
And you got her killed.  
Vay’len leant up against the shop door, weeping into the woodwork. Rain poured over him, soaking his hair. The last thing he remembered was Roza thanking him and forcing a false smile. To have just seen a real smile, not one that was covering up her pain or her shattered heart, Vay’len tried to recall a time that she had ever smiled without restraint. There had only been one time; when they had raced their horses towards the Pelago forest for the first time. He pictured it now, how she had truly grinned with joy, the wind rushing through her pale hair and Jamie clinging onto her for dear life. He wished so much that he had slowed his horse, to let her win the race, to have seen her smile for a few more moments.  
Even though he had won the race, teased her for being a sore loser, Roza had stared at him with… with so much understanding, as if she would always fight by his side. But now she is gone.

Chapter Thirty-Six  
Full Circle 

By nightfall the rain had ceased, the thick clouds had dispersed to reveal a waxing moon and trillions of blinking stars. Rozaline Kiezar lay in a soggy ditch, her glassy eyes staring up at the magnificent sky. Her execution had been public, but it had been so sudden that barely anyone in Raydon had witnessed the shooting.  
She had lined up in front of the firing squad and smiled in the face of death, as she always had done her whole life. And no one had known, and no one had mourned for her.  
Roza had dropped out of existence for a while, until the cool night’s breeze re-awoke her wounded and shattered body. She sat up with disbelief as the holes in her chest, gut, legs and even her neck began to close back up. She coughed up a glob of dried blood and began to scrabble out of the muddy ditch where her body had been unceremoniously dumped.  
Once she was back on solid ground, Roza checked her hips for her swords. “Fuck,” she cursed, catching sight of her filthy arms and ruined clothes. “Ah yes, I never gave up Seth, so that bitch never gave me my swords back.”  
It took her a while to gather her thoughts and figure out a way back into the city. To find a way to repay Gustav Hollington for his hospitality. 

***

Raydon city’s bells rang at dawn. News travelled fast that an assassin had got into the palace and murdered the youngest prince and his mistress in their bed.  
City guards searched the streets frantically for the assassin, but how could any of them suspect that it had been their own captain? Their captain that had been executed for treason less than a day ago.  
Content to have her swords back, and the Buckeye galdarkas that she had been borrowing, Roza ended up outside Celeste’s chocolate shop at sunrise. She had searched almost everywhere else in the city for Vay’len and Michael. Neither of them had left a trace of a note for her.  
Maybe they think I am dead? She speculated, quickly correcting herself, truly dead…  
Roza had no time to wait for the shop to open, not with half the city being turned over to find the assassin. She threw a rock up at Celeste’s window.  
After two more rocks, the noblewoman finally opened her lattice window and squinted down at her very early visitor.  
“Is that you, Rozaline?” she checked, “Or some sort of bog monster?”  
“Don’t make me climb up there,” Roza joked, “I’ll probably break your sign again.”  
“Give me a moment,” Celeste called down, shutting the window behind her.  
The key scraped in the lock and the chocolatier almost fainted as she opened the door for her friend. “You look dreadful, darling! Gods, what is that smell?”  
“Probably me,” Roza grinned through the soil and the dried blood. “I’m surprised you slept through the bells.”  
“I had only just gone back to sleep,” she said, wrapping her lacy shawl around her almost bare body, “Until you near shattered my window in. Let me run you a bath, for heavens’ sake. Did you sleep in a swamp?”  
“I may as well have,” Roza shrugged, following her friend through to the backroom and upstairs to her private rooms. There was a familiar scent in the air, underneath the overpowering aroma of chocolate, but Roza couldn’t quite pin-point what it was.  
“They aren’t out there searching for you, are they?” Celeste asked with alarm, after pushing open her bathroom door and kneeling down to run a bath.  
Roza grinned turned wilder.  
“My dear, why?” she glanced over her shoulder. Even in the early hours of the morning, without her makeup on or her hair styled, Celeste was beautiful.  
Roza began to peel away her damaged and stained clothes, and chose a bar of soap from a wicker basket. “I found the Raven leader,” she eventually replied.  
“Who was he?” Celeste wondered with curiosity, taking a seat on the lid of her lavatory.  
“She was Belinda Grey.”  
“I’ve never heard of her,” she puzzled.  
Roza rested her weapons on the side of the bath before stepping into the soothingly warm water. She let her shoulders relax, the heat washing over her.  
“She was sleeping with Prince Gustav,” she informed. “I’m guessing the corrupt guard that I killed wasn’t joking when he said that he had powerful allies.”  
“But, why?” Celeste continued to puzzle, “Why would the prince corrupt his own city?”  
“Something about a revolution happening. I’m guessing Gustav wasn’t happy with his eldest brother’s rule of the country.”  
“Of course,” Celeste rolled her icy eyes, her voice thick with sarcasm. “Why talk out problems like a normal family, when you can just hire a gang of thugs to do your dirty work?”  
Roza nodded, lathering up the soap on her arms. She was sure that she had never been so filthy in her life. “They seemed to want Jamie Claylorne for their evil schemes.”  
“Jamie?”  
“Victor and Violet Claylorne have a son that they never talk about,” she explained, “Due to the fact that he’s a mage.”  
“I suppose those fires around the city were his doing, then?” Celeste predicted.  
“Yes, but they were an accident. Sort of…”  
The noblewoman raised a dainty eyebrow and crossed her leg over her knee. “Try telling that to little Naomi.”  
“Apparently her big sister, Zarah Quarette was fond of slave labour to make her jewellery,” Roza went on.  
“Well, this is a lot to take in,” she said with a sigh. “Was that part of the revolution? Burning everyone who owns slaves?”  
Roza shrugged before soaping up her legs. “I can’t say. I didn’t give Belinda a chance to speak before I slit her throat,” she said nonchalantly.  
“You have quite a way with people, don’t you, dear?”  
She grinned before dunking her bloodstained hair into the water. She didn’t mention the torture or the prolonged abuse. There was no point telling Celeste about the hours that she spent tied up, remembering the eyes of her attackers. Or how she had tracked them down in the palace and gouged each of their eyes out before cutting Gustav and Belinda into ribbons. When she was done, there was nothing left of their faces to recognise.  
“What’s that on your shoulder?” Celeste noticed the brand that hadn’t healed, unlike the rest of the wounds on Roza’s body.  
“Something Belinda left, for me to remember her by,” Roza uttered, quickly changing the subject, “Did Michael return your cloak?”  
“Yes, he did, the other night.”  
“I haven’t seen him since then,” Roza said, masking how dejected she was feeling with a small smirk.  
“He – he said that he had done something terrible, and then he disappeared,” Celeste confessed. “He did worry me slightly.”  
“I made him do something terrible,” she admitted, staring down into the dirt soaked water.  
Celeste raised both her eyebrows this time. “Are you all right, darling? Truly? You can tell me.”  
“I asked him to turn me into a vampire,” she replied bluntly.  
Celeste snorted a laugh through her nose. “That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard all week.”  
“I’m not joking. For once in my life, I’m tellin’ ya the truth,” Roza said, cleaning the dirt from under her nails.  
“Like the blood-sucking kind of vampire?” she wondered, “I thought that they had all been hunted down centuries ago?”  
Roza shrugged again, “Or they just went into hiding.”  
“Well, what are you going to do now, my dear?”  
“I think… I think I’ll go home for a while. I don’t want Vay’len to see me like this. I don’t want him to blame himself for it,” she decided.  
“You’re not going to say goodbye?” Celeste asked. “What about your friend that he brought here? Taylor? You’re not going to wake her up before you go?”  
Roza shook her head slowly, regretfully. “Only you will know.”  
Celeste put her hand to her heart, “No words will leave this room.”  
“Thank you, Celeste. I’ll write a note for Vay’len, do y’think you could deliver it?” she said, sitting up in the bath now that she was fully clean.  
“Of course, my dear,” Celeste got up and handed her friend a chocolate coloured towel. “You can’t go back home in those rags, though.”  
“Do you have something that will block out the pesky sunlight?” Roza grinned, wrapping the towel around her muscular body.  
“I’m sure we can find something suitable,” Celeste said with an elegant twirl of her wrist.

**Author's Note:**

> The second book will be coming soon. Honestly, I'm struggling to decide what to title it as. It will be a continuation of Vay'len and Rozaline, which mainly needs a bit of editing still.   
> Thank you to all the readers for getting this far ;) 
> 
> I have posted a very long prequel to this series, set centuries before Roza was alive.  
> Cheers,  
> G Monica.


End file.
